Flying Pillars Across the Universe
by Invisible Sandwich
Summary: Another crossfic involving Dragon Ball Z and various universes. When Tao comes into possession of the entire "Dragon Ball Z" manga, the universe begins to collapse. About 2/3rds complete, but probably never going to get finished.
1. Interloper

Flying Pillars Across the Universe

Synopsis: Mercenary Tao finds the entire Dragon Ball manga in his cabin and lays megalomanical plans involving Raditz, Nappa, and Vegeta.

After his unfortunate encounter with one Hank Hill, Mercenary Tao had somehow woken up in his proper continuity.

"Why does the inside of my mouth taste like crystalized rage?" he shouted to nothing in particular. He rubbed his eyes - a reflex from his days as a proper human. Then, he stood up, surveying his surroundings.

It was a small cabin. He used to live here, before he had an unfortunate incident with his brother over a simple meal. Suprisingly, the centuries had been good to it - It had retained its general shape, and even had some of its roof left. And it certainly called into question the validity of his previous combat encounter.

Then, he saw a hefty book laying on the ground. A quick glance at the cover - "Dragon Ball - The Entire Series". The cover depicted several boys and men with spikey hair; one seemed very familar.

*What? Is this ... that kid Goku? How did Crane get his hands on this? When did this happen? I really need to at least glance through this.*

So he did. It appeared to be the comedic adventures of a boy and his friends searching for Dragon Balls.

*What? Is this historical?* Tao wondered as he reached the chapters relating to the Red Ribbon Army a few hours later.

*This is historical! ... and it's unusually cruel to me.* he thought as he read through what appeared to be a fight between himself and Goku.

*Let me guess, eventually I'll see myself fighting that Tien Shinhan fellow.*  
Continued reading did, in fact, lead to such a fight. Naturally, Tao was shocked and appalled. Not long after, he reached a little page stating the following:

"Here begin the events of what, in its anime adaptation, was called Dragon Ball Z. The story begins on October 12th, 761, when Goku's son, Gohan is four years old."

Tao checked his internal clock. *October 9th, 761.* A few more chapters, and there was a location - Master Roshi's house.

"This is propituous. Not only can I get rid of Goku using this information, I can possibly also rid myself of Master Roshi. Then I will be the most powerful being on this planet," he muttered.

*Looks like me, Goku, and this 'Raditz' fellow have an appointment,* he thought. *Good thing I learned how to skydance, otherwise I'd never get there on time.*

And so he flew, taking the anthology with him.

Meanwhile, for reasons unknown, Kami/Piccolo was in some distress.

"Do you feel it? The timeline is about to warp into forms incomprehensible even to the Namek mind," Kami thought.

"Of course I do. You don't think I'm unaware of our linked mind, do you?" Piccolo mentally snarled.

"Normally I would send Mr. Popo down to resolve this, but there's a stigma against blackface these days..."

"Just dye him blue. I don't think anyone will notice."

"Alright then." And then, Kami turned to Mr. Popo.

"I heard what you said. There is no need for you to restate it, and I will do what is neccesary for the preservation of the universe."

And so Mr. Popo painted himself blue before descending to Earth, hoping that it would prevent potential racist allegations.

Three days later, Tao was a mile away from the Kame House, while Raditz, having just faced off with Piccolo, was making all haste towards the largest power signature he could find.

Hint: It definitely wasn't Tao's.

Raditz had just thrown Krillin through the wall of Master Roshi's house. Goku and his son had just come out, venting their fury and confusion at Raditz, who had just referred to Goku as "Kakarott", as well as a Saiyan.

"Already the first threads are unraveling," muttered Kami.

"I'll stop Raditz before anything happens." Piccolo responded.

"Going to use your 'Special Beam Cannon'?"

"Of course I am-"

"Do not announce it. It would be a terrible idea."

"...Do you have any idea how energy attacks work? Have you ever fought a single battle in your life?"

"No time to explain. Something unusual has come up."

Mercenary Tao had soared in.

"Tao? You're not supposed to be here!" Goku shouted.

"I can go wherever I want and do what I want. Today I seek to pluck this 'Raditz' and keep him from performing his agenda, leaving me free to kill you at my leisure."

"WHAT? How did you know my name?"Raditz shouted.

"Let's just say that I have a record of the future. If you do what I say, you will come out of this alive."

"I'll kill you-"

"Not so fast, monkey boy. This book is an extremely accurate prophecy of the future should you not do my bidding. Take a look at the bookmark." He tossed the book to Raditz, who opened it to the marked page.

"What is this? I can't read this garbage, it's all in symbol gibberish-"

"Let me see that-" said Goku, snatching it away from Raditz.

"Heh, this guy looks like me. And the book's in Japanese." Goku passed it back to Raditz.

"Uh... Goku? You probably shouldn't have given the book back to him," Krillin muttered."

"Come on, it's obvious that he's bluffing!" And he turned to Krillin.

"And just between us... I assure you I can take Tao. If he gets this Raditz fellow out of the way, then all we have to worry about is Piccolo coming on to - I mean after us-" Goku thought-spoke to Krillin.

"I heard that!"

"Didn't see you there, Piccolo." Accompanied by a quick nod in the Namek's direction.

"As much as I'd like to kill you and take over this planet, Kami says I'm not allowed to, and also that Tao's up to something."

Meanwhile, Tao had convinced Raditz not to kill him ("Yet", according to Raditz). "Let's leave before they can formulate a plan."

"..." The idea of not fighting was anthema to Raditz, but Tao had already flown off.

"Get back here!" he shouted, jumping after Tao, and attracting the attention of Goku and friends.

"First a crazy guy comes up here and claims that I'm a 'Saiyan', then Mercenary Tao shows up and convinces him to follow him... I'm confused now," said Goku.

".. Follow them," growled Piccolo.

"I'd like to, but I can't sense their ki signatures."

And then, Piccolo facepalmed.

Tao and Raditz ended up in a secluded area.

"Conceal your power. You don't want them coming after you and killing you," said Tao.

"They'll never kill me! I'm too good of a warrior!"

"Actually, according to this, you're a very poor warrior. I like the fact that you took Goku's son hostage, but you drastically underestimated Goku's willingness to die-"

"If I had known he was so willing to get himself killed, I would've helped him along in the first place!"

"Well, you'll need my help just to survive on Earth. I have fought this group on multiple occasions, and they simply will not give up." Tao handed the book to Raditz.

"You know I can't read this-"

"Look at the pictures, you simpleton."

And Raditz looked at the pictures. He saw his tail pulled, his armor cracked by a child (Son Gohan), and himself eventually pierced by an energy beam as Goku restrained him.

"I would tread very carefully around these warriors. They're not the sharpest knives in the drawer for sure, but they are much more intelligent and determined than you-"

Raditz could take no more, and clocked Tao in the jaw. And Tao collapsed to the ground. But as Raditz towered over him, attempting to deliver a killing blow...

"I wouldn't do that," said Tao. " You may enjoy the torture and killing, but without my guidance, you won't make it through the next few days." And this time, Tao managed to dodge a haymaker.

"Trust me."

"I'm not going to-"

"Raditz! What is the matter with you! Kill him already!"

It appeared to Tao that the Saiyan had flinched as a result of a bug in the ear or something.

"I was about to before you distracted me!"

"Just kill him before we have to come over here and kill you!"

"But that doesn't make any sense! You're over a year away from this planet!"

"... if you don't kill him now, you can consider your days numbered."

As Raditz appeared to talk to himself, Tao picked up the book, lazily flipped through pages...

"You're talking to Nappa and Vegeta, are you not?" he said, almost nonchalantly, snickering as if he thought himself witty.

"No, I'm talking to Broly and Paragus. Of course I'm talking to them. How the hell do you know?"

"Because of the book. And it's through that scouter of yours. How many examples of this is it going to take to get this through your head?"

Raditz was silent for a moment.

"Look, I'll put you on the line with this fellow." And he handed the scouter to Tao, who put it on. Gibberish and humanoid silhouettes danced across its inner surface.

"Hello, Vegeta. Hello, Nappa. I am Mercenary Tao and I have disturbing news for you."

It was Nappa who broke the awkward silence that followed.

"There is ABSOLUTELY NO WAY that you could know my name."

"I read it in a book. Are you Vegeta or Nappa? Because of the circumstances, I have no way of knowing."

"... This is Nappa. What's next? Are you going to tell me something stupid about Kakarot?"

"... Are all your names bad puns on vegetables?"

"I take offense to that!"

"Do what you will. But you won't get to learn how to defeat Frieza, or become a Super Saiyan-"

"What? Nappa, shut up for a minute. This is Vegeta, and there is no way that you could know anything you've informed us of-"

"But there is. Come to earth and I will tell you everything."

"If you don't, Frieza will kill you, and Kakarot will be the only one capable of becoming a Super Saiyan-"

"I want to become a Super Saiyan!" shouted Nappa over the communication lines.

"We both do, Nappa. How do we know that Raditz didn't break down and tell you everything?"

"Because without my help, you will lose. And lose. And keep losing. You will always be a shadow of Son Goku."

And another brief silence. When Vegeta spoke, he sounded calm, but his words suggested a seething, horrendous rage that itself could kill.

"That's it. Me and Nappa are departing for Earth right now to murder you in the most horrid way possible. See you next year-"

"I must warn you that killing me deprives you of the information you need-"

"I don't NEED your stupid misinformation."

Meanwhile, on some obscure planet halfway across the galaxy, Vegeta ripped off his scouter and threw it into his nearby capsule.

"Get in your capsule, Nappa. You know what we're doing." And their long journey to Earth began. 


	2. Deviation

Flying Pillars Part II

Technically, this is the first part of the story in which crossover characters make their presence felt - specifically characters from Akira Toriyama's "Dr. Slump" series.

On Earth, Kami vented consternation, and Piccolo, having to put up with his inner thoughts, took it out on some mountains. Eventually, he ended up in the Kami House.

"They need training. They need training very badly - Were they to face the Saiyans alone the results would be bad enough. But it seems they're getting outside guidance."

"Will you SHUT UP about the accursed monkey boy Saiyans-" Piccolo said. Goku and his family were in earsight.

"Hey, that's not very nice. And I'm pretty sure that Raditz guy was lying," Goku said. Then he did quite the double take. But he was beaten to it by his wife, Chi-Chi.

"What are you still doing in our house, Piccolo? Do I have to kick your ass to get you to leave?"

"What... what... uh... is 'kill Goku and take over the world' what you were looking for?" muttered Piccolo.

Gohan wandered over. "You shouldn't kill people, Mr. Piccolo. It's evil."

"Yeah, don't kill me. I like my life-" Goku finally managed his double take.

"What are you doing here, anyways?"

"The door was open."

"You don't seem as enraged as you were the last time we met."

"Kami won't let me scream obscenities." He remembered a few hours ago. He was about to say "Fuck" at the top of his lungs when he realized what Kami was implying with his cryptic comments about Tao.

*You do that, I won't ever shut up.* he'd heard in his head.

"Wait. Four years ago you were the incarnation of evil and now Kami can prevent you from hurting a butterfly?" said Goku.

Krillin walked at that moment.

"Sounds like Piccolo's a mama's boy now! Ha ha."

"Don't make fun of him, guys. Maybe he's no longer evil," offered Gohan.

Silence followed, interrupted by the sounds of cooking. Apparently venomous scorn wasn't enough for Chi Chi, so she channeled the anger into housework.

"Uh..."

She threw a knife Piccolo's way. It would've killed any normal human being, but nobody here was really "normal". The knife was caught effortlessly and thrown to the ground. Chi Chi would've rushed at him, causing an ugly brawl, but at that exact moment, the doorbell rang. It was Kami.

"Hello, Gohan. You're growing up to be a big Saiyan. Have a lollipop." And one was passed to Gohan.

"Thank you, sir, but my mother says I can't take candy from strangers." And it was passed back to Kami.

"May I please talk to your father?"

"I guess..." And so Gohan called his father, who came to the door.

"It's you, Kami! You're ... green as ever!"

"Uh, yes. There is an important matter I need to discuss with you and your friends. Mind if I step inside?"

"Right, whatever."

So he let himself inside.

"Now there's two Piccolos? I can't take it anymore!" screamed Chi Chi. Then she drew a knife and rushed Kami, who attempted to defend himself with his staff. One roundhouse kick knocked him over, and soon, Chi Chi was at his throat with the blade.

"Give me one reason I shouldn't slit your throat." she snarled.

"No, don't kill him!" shouted Goku, attempting to pull her off. Then he got knocked across the room by a well placed punch.

"Heh, look at that. The strongest man on earth and he gets knocked away like a weakling," muttered Piccolo.

"Calm down, Chi Chi. I am here because I need the services of most everyone in the house," Kami said.

"Alright, fine. I won't kill you... instantly." And she loosened her grasp on Kami, allowing him to move slightly.

"Thank you. May I please stand up?"

"...No."

"I'll get everyone else," said Gohan, who shuffled off to fetch people. He came back a minute later, bringing a substantial entourage.

"Tien Shinhan? Chiaotzu? Your presence here implies the truth of my theories. Why did you come here anyways?" asked Kami.

"Me and Chiaotzu wanted to participate in the reunion. Yamcha says he's coming, but his plane got delayed."

"Yeah, I guess we should wait for him," said Goku.

They did, and Chi Chi kept vigil with the knife. Eventually Goku and son were the first to see the dot on the horizon.

"So wait, can all your friends fly, Daddy?"

"Well, the martial artists can."

"I want to be a martial artist!"

"Maybe when you're a bit older."

The small dot had become a flying man in a baseball cap.

"Guess you weren't up for taking a boat, Yamcha."

"What? Flying is quicker."

"Well, with Yamcha, everyone is here," said Kami from his standpoint on the ground. "Gather around. Unless Chi Chi lets me stand up, it's going to be very cramped."

And so, much of cast of Dragon Ball assembled around Kami and Chi Chi.

"The matters I must discuss are in fact very grave and revolve around the happenings of yesterday, when Goku was accosted by an alien calling himself Raditz." And so Kami explained the details of the event.

"I never knew Tao was capable of that," said Yamcha.

"It gets much worse. Despite his attempts to hide his knowledge by shielding against telepathy, I have found out that he has learned to see the future."

"A future where we stop him, right?" said Gohan.

"Not in that way. He has found a book detailing the next twenty years or so in shocking detail and plans to use this information to make himself the ruler of the universe."

"So what? We can just train up and defeat him easily, right?" said Goku.

"I wish it were that simple. His attempts are slowly, but surely damaging time and reality, and if we attempt to stop him with violence, the results would be worse than what is 'supposed' to happen-"

"You wouldn't mind telling us, would you?"

"I'd prefer not to. It will distract from what has to be done."

They looked at him.

"Well, I can't have you believing that events are going to transpire in the exact same fashion as they would otherwise, right?"

"We realize that, Kami," Piccolo grumbled.

"Goku doesn't."

"What, did someone say my name?"

"Calm down. I have a plan. But it requires some travel," Kami announced.

"Are we going to take a plane?"

"Sort of. But it only seats seven people. I'll explain along the way. We need to choose five more people. One slot is reserved for a special guest."

Everyone looked at Kami like he'd had sex with a rat.

"I'll go!" said Goku.

"Makes sense. Four people left."

"I'm not letting you leave me!" shouted Chi Chi.

"Okay, that's three people left."

"Goku's my friend. I'd like to come along." said Krillin.

"You need my strength. I'm coming too, " said Piccolo.

"There's one slot left." A moment of brief silence. Then Yamcha, Tien Shinhan, and Chiaotzu fell over.

"Before you deliberate, I must say that we need a trained force to ensure we have adequate information on Mercenary Tao's movements and plans."

"Uh... guys? I think I know who might be good for that last slot."

"Yes, Goku, who is it?" Goku told Kami who it was.

"He seems appropriate. I need to fetch the transportation, and the guest. I'll be right back."

He left the house, and entered an old propeller driven plane, which took off after a few minutes.

"Where'd he get that?" thought Piccolo.

A few hours later, Kami had landed outside a place known only as Penguin Village, where the people were round and portly, and poop grew on sticks.

He rang a doorbell.

"Uh, hello? Who are you?"

"I am Kami. You're Mr. Norimaki, am I correct?"

"Yes. We've never met before, have we?"

"Right. Do you remember a boy named Goku?"

"Vaguely..."

"Well, he's working with me on a task that, frankly, requires your heightened intelligence."  
"Send my son. He's smarter than me."

"Did I also mention that it's extremely dangerous?"

"He'll be okay."

"...Look, I can't afford to take children where I'm going. If they died, you'd go insane from the trauma."

"Well, I'm also setting up a think tank of sorts. If he's so smart, why don't you put him in?"

"What? You said he was too young! Make up your mind."

"It's not my choice where he goes. It's yours..."

"Too much pressure!"

"Look, you should join us. I brought my plane. I was hoping you would."

"Oh, come on! It'd be fun! Besides, we could really use your brains. "

"Uh.."

"You have 10 minutes to decide." And Kami walked back to the plane. A small rotund boy was standing there.

"Oh, it's you, Obatchaman. We met during the great Piccolo scare of 756, did we not?"

"I kind of remember it."

"Right. Could you go in that house and ask Dr. Slump to play outside?"

"Okay." So he did. A few seconds later, Senbei came out.

"Nice plane. I thought you could fly."

"I can fly. But planes are faster... I'd hop in if I was you."

"Well..."

"There'll be hot women-" *Why didn't I think of that in the first place?*

Senbei was in the plane.

"I see you've made your decision." And a few minutes later they took off.  
_

"Raditz! Don't just stand there! I can hit you any time I want!" shouted Tao. It was a grassy field, where in an alternate reality, Piccolo would've pierced Raditz clean with his "Special Beam Cannon".

"I'm charging an attack!" Neon blue energy gathered around Raditz' hands. Before he could do anything useful with them, Tao had knocked him down with a quick elbow to the solar plexus.

"You left your back open... like everyone else on the damn planet."

*How'd I get into this crap, anyways?* thought Raditz.

He thought back to yesterday. It started off well - he'd caught the bullets from some farmer's shotgun, thrown energy at a green guy, tossed a bald fellow through a wall while other people babbled in confusion, and then this cyborg fellow comes up, claims he knows the future, you go chasing after him and when he lands you try to kill him...

Suddenly Raditz had drifted off into the solitude of his (rather simple) mind.

"I've come to realize that the way you fight will not be adequate for the coming days. In fact, I could probably beat you in a fight right now," Tao had sneer-spoke.

"You won't live to regret your hubris!" he'd shouted, before rushing the puny human. "Your power level is a sixth of mine!" And his fists were about to deliver a steel crushing blow to Tao, when he'd jumped out of the way.

"You damn fool," Tao had said while soaring through the air. "Pure power means nothing."

"Coward!" He'd followed Tao into the air, but was knocked to the ground by a few quick jabs.

"I'm not going to hold back anymore!" And so, Raditz began charging a powerful energy wave. Tao did nothing to stop it, but dodged it effortlessly by again jumping.

"Not going to work. Try something quicker."

"Fool! I'm a top class warior!" And as Tao came down, he elbowed him in the back. This of course, hurt Tao a lot, and he ended up on the ground.

"Uh... good work. Maybe if you keep doing as I say you'll survive..." Tao said, seemingly in horrible pain.

"You won't-" And Raditz was about to deliver a finishing blow (*Maybe I'll rip his head off and see what makes him so stupid!*)...

"DODUN RAY!" Tao's signature energy beam hit Raditz in his left leg, throwing onto the grass.

"Trust me. You need my help." Raditz's consciousness jumped back to the present, where Tao had coincidentally said the same thing.

"..." And then he fell over, as Tao had struck him in the back.

"Pay attention." Raditz rolled and hapzardly aimed a kick at Tao's shins.

"That's better," said Tao. "You want to beat someone in a fight, you do not give them time to say 'Kamehameha' or 'Destructo Disc' or 'I'm gonna kick your ass!'. When they cup their hands to channel energy is when you will punch them in the face."

"What if they have tentacles? Then what the hell am I supposed to do?"

"Work it out."

And so they continued.

Kami had returned to the Kame House with a horny Senbei Norimaki accompanying him.

"So where are we?" Senbei had asked.

"I'm just picking up the rest of the group." And Kami jumped out of the plane. The group he'd handpicked was waiting for him.

"Hello, Yajirobe." Yajirobe stared at him.

"Have we met?"

"Doubt it." They looked at each other.

"Am I gonna have to give you Senzu beans?"

"Probably not."

Awkward silence.

"I guess we should get going, eh?" said Goku.

"Might as well." And Kami opened the doors on the plane. Everyone entered except Yajirobe.

"Please don't tell me I have to come along."

"Nobody is forcing you to come. But we could use the Senzu beans, and if things get rough, we could use your swordsmanship."

"But... but... nobody said there'd be any fighting!"

"Trust me, there won't be. And there'll be plenty of good food with the places we're going."

"Good food, eh? I'd hope so. Except for the fact I can get good food here."

"Come on. It'll be fun!"

"Are you alright in the head?"

Goku came out of the plane, and stared at Kami and Yajirobe.

"What's the holdup, guys?" he said.

"Yajirobe's not sure wants to come," responded Kami.

"Aw, come on. It'll be fun. You're one of the strongest humans who ever lived. I'm sure they'll love you... wherever they're going."

"... Alright, fine. But these people had better love me." And they reentered the plane.

It was a very small passenger plane, but the accomodations were first class. The seats were comfortable and could fold out into beds., plenty of leg room, lots of food, even a full functioning bathroom.

Goku had already broached the food - several chickens, a pound of salad, a dozen giant chocolate chip cookies, mountains of rice, agar-based deserts, pastries, sandwiches.

"Kami made sure there was enough food for everybody. And he really knows how much I eat... or for that matter you," said Goku.

"Yeah, if Goku wasn't here, we wouldn't be able to finish it before even the nonperishable stuff went," said Krillin, giggling slightly.

"If I ate as much food as Goku apparently does, I... I'd be fat," muttered Senbei, gingerly picking up a sandwich and nibbling on it. This was the cue - everyone grabbed what they could before Goku and Yajirobe started devouring the setting.

"Right. I'll be setting the course. We need to retrieve a special weapon from another planet," said Kami over an intercom.

"Sounds fun. But this is an airplane. How are we going to get to that planet?" Piccolo responded.

"I have some special technology that I've been working on with Mr. Popo. I'll explain once we get there... and I'd fasten your seatbelts if I were you."

They did.

"This better be good," said Chi Chi.

"I'm sure it'll be worth our time," Goku said.

"Alright, we're going now." A clunk somewhere in the plane, the propeller started turning, the muffled roar of an engine. So far, the plane sounded like a plane.

"So what did you decide to do with Gohan?" asked Goku.

"I sent him to West City to live with the Briefs. It'll be good for his education. Definitely better than living with Master Roshi."

"Master Roshi's a good guy, what grudge do you have against him?"

"I'm not big on having my son raised by a pervert."

Further conversation was interrupted by keening wail and the sudden darkening of the outside world.

"Everything is working as intended," said Kami over the intercom.

The scenery had been replaced with starfields lazily passing by. For a moment, everything flashed red.

"Did anyone just see themselves hitting weird crab things with a crowbar?" said Krillin.

"No, sorry," said Yajirobe.

Another red flash.  
"Heheh, I farted," muttered Yajirobe.

Another.  
"Hey, if this jacket makes me more powerful, I'll certainly buy it!" said Goku.

"What the hell are you guys going on about?" shouted Piccolo.

Yet another red flash.  
"What? For a moment I felt a great hatred of rats and a desire to study cryptography..." muttered Chi Chi.

The flashes kept coming.

"I am not drinking that. It's got hemlock. It's toxic." Piccolo said.

"Sorry, but these are normal side effects. I'll explain when we get there."

Further flashes, then all light disappeared.

"Almost there..."

The lights came on.

"And we're here. Welcome to Bl-"

"KAMI! THERE'S A MONSTER IN THE SHIP! WHAT DO WE DO?" shouted Yajirobe.

"What the hell? It's me, Piccolo!" Piccolo looked at himself.

"I appear to have become some sort of grotesque light green squid alien with one eye. And I'm wearing a space helmet." Piccolo's voice had went up several semitones, from a gravelly base to a sonorous baritone. He stared at everyone else in the spaceship.

"Quit looking at me like that. You're all yellow freaks with bulging eyes and overbites."

They looked at each other.

"Senbei, could you come up to the cockpit? The navigation unit's bugging up, and I need your technical expertise to fix it." Kami's voice had, itself, raised in pitch and filled out.

"Also, I've become what Piccolo is, so don't poop yourself when you come up here."

Mr. Norimaki dutifully shuffled to a door at the end of the passenger cabin.

"I wonder where we are, and why we've become such weird looking freaks in the process of getting there," said Krillin.

"Uh... it appears to be a place called... Springfield."


	3. Yellow Peril

The airplane was vacated. Goku brought out a chicken leg with him.

It turned out they had landed in a suburb of a regular disposition. The houses were mostly identical, the occasional paint job not withstanding. Small children were playing in the streets, throwing various balls of similar shapes.

Suddenly, a boy on a skateboard landed on the plane, denting the top, making a beeline for an open garage. He was followed by a girl on a bike. As if this weren't enough, a car drove down the road and crashed into the plane. A corpulent man exited the car and shook his fist.

"Who put this plane here? I'm trying to go to Moe's-" He stared at the passengers.

"Who're you?"

"I'm Son Goku. Me and my friends came here to fetch this... thing that exists."

"I'm Homer Simpson. I live here. What are you? New neighbors?"

"Sorry, we're only going to be here for a few hours."

"Goku, could you come in for a second? I need you to retrieve a tool," said Kami, one of his newfound "tentacles" drifting outside the door.

"AARGH! A MONSTER!" And Homer grabbed a convenient 2x4 and rushed the tentacle.

"Don't hurt me!"

The tentacle retracted as fast as expected, but Homer rushed into the plane. There he was met with the rest of the crew.

"Uh... hello there," said Krillin.

"There's more of you?" Homer shouted.

"Seven of us," said Senbei.

"Well, I hope you're not going to be staying in the middle of the road." Then Homer saw the food.

"What is this? A barbeque? Well, why didn't you say so in the-"

"GET OUT."

And before he knew it, Homer Simpson had been forced to vacate the ship by an enraged woman.

"Lousy neighbors. They're worse than Flanders."

He wandered into his house's kitchen.

"The new neighbors won't let me eat any of their food," Homer moaned to Lisa, who had shuffled in conveniently.

"Dad... we have plenty of food."

"Oh, right." And so, Homer opened the fridge. It was full of food - mostly fattening things (when rubbed against paper, the paper would turn clear), and beer. He took a Duff beer, and was in the process of opening it when the doorbell rang. The beer dropped from his stubby fingers, tipped over, released its contents on the floor.

"Aw, crap! ... best get another one." So Homer did, and had already swigged a mouthful of beer when he opened the door. It was Goku.

"Sorry to bother you, sir. But Kami says we need something to fix the ship and that... uh... something only exists in something called 'Uncle Jim's Country Filling'-"

"That stuff? No, you can't have it. And they don't sell it anymore."

"Aw. We really need it. Is there anything we can do to change your mind?"

Homer stared at Kami's damaged plane.

"I'd like some of that guy's food."

"Uh... what's the appeal of our food?"

"Foreign delicacies?"

"...Right. I'll talk to Kami."

Goku explained the situation to Kami.

"What? He wants to our food? What does he see in it?" said Kami, one eye distended for shock.

"Calories?" Senbei offered.

"Indeed, calories. I may be able to keep him from consuming too much of our stock, but it's a risky plan." He explained it to Goku.

"Alright, I guess I'll let him in."

So Homer came onto the deck of Kami's plane, immediately attracting glares from the rest of the passengers.

"You need to lose weight, man." said Krillin. Everyone laughed.

"Hey! I'm not that cruel to you." Homer shouted.

"Don't mind them. I think you're a nice guy," said Goku. "Incidentally, you could fetch a couple hundred sandwiches from the fridge? I have an amusing idea."

*What? Is he going to give me the sandwiches? Mmm... sandwich.* Homer thought. He carried them out by the dozens - they varied dramatically in fillings and even somewhat in size. Soon, the table was buckling under the weight of the food.

"You're hungry, right?"

"Of course I'm hungry!" said Homer.

"I'd like to challenge you to an eating contest, and see who can eat more stuff If I win, I get something from you, and if you win, you can get something from me... and I'm pretty sure you have something we need."

"The 'Country Filling'? Knowing you, I won't have to part with that. Tell you what, if I win, I want you to drop your pants in front of this guy I know..."

"Alright, I will," said Goku. "Krillin, would you judge this contest?"

"Sure can. Begin eating... now."

Within seconds, the two parties had already put down a dozen sandwiches between themselves.

"Man, I never thought anyone could match Goku's appetite," Yajirobe muttered.

A few seconds later, another dozen sandwiches consumed.

"If they finish them all, we'll have to make sandwiches from the ingredients we have," declared Piccolo.

"We'll just buy more from a local store," said Kami.

"Uh, guys, you'll have to do something," Krillin said, pointing to the rapidly diminishing pile of sandwiches.

"Do you guys have any beer?" asked Homer, several chunks of meat adorned with mayonnaise dancing in his mouth.

"I'll check." Krillin looked at the fridge.

"Wait, who's keeping score?" said Goku.

"I'm working on it," Piccolo responded.

Now there was only one sandwich. After Goku and Homer briefly stared at each other, they both made a grab for the sandwich. Each one, realizing what was at stake, was pulling hard enough to break the other's bones, yet the sandwich was unscathed.

"You're both equal at 80 sandwiches each. The one who consumes this final sandwich will be the winner," Piccolo announced.

The tug of war intensified.

"I found you a beer," said Krillin, returning with one.

And when Homer turned briefly to drool over the beer, he loosened his grip on the final sandwich, allowing Goku to cram it in his mouth.

"I win! You going to give us the country filling now?" he said.

"Yeah, whatever." And so, Homer plodded out of the airplane and into his house. Along the way, a thought occured to him.

*Well, it's a good thing I lied about the country filling... got a clean meal out of it. Hehehehe.*

And then another thought.

*I'm going to have to moon Flanders myself... D'oh!*

Soon, he was back with the required item.

"Your help is appreciated. We'll be gone in a few minutes," said Krillin, before taking the "filling" and closing the door.

"Finally that filthy man is gone," said Chi Chi, crossing her arms. "Had he been in here for even a moment longer, I might've killed him, and his house would need repairs."

"Chi Chi! That's horrible!" Goku shouted at her.

"What? He's horrible too!"

"Sorry, Chi Chi. I can't dislike a man with a healthy appetite."

Awkward silence, interrupted by the roar of the engine and the shrill noises of machinery, followed by the fading of the outside world to black, and the appearance of stars.

"So, uh, Kami. Mind explaining why we went there in the first place?" said Krillin.

"Error in the navigation unit," Kami responded over the intercoms.

"Yes, but why are we in the plane in the first place?"

"That's very simple - we need to retrieve an item that doesn't exist in our universe, but does in others. It should allow us to engage in combat with anything we so please back in our universe-"

"But we're already capable of doing that!"

"Sure, Goku could take on everything in his sleep, but the rest of us... I hate to admit it, but we're not nearly at that level," said Yajirobe.

"I'm stronger than Goku, and if I have a chance, I'll prove it!" shouted Piccolo.

"Yes, I'm sure you will."

"Uh, Kami? What are the red flashes for?" Goku asked.

"Just interference from other universes- Oop, just felt one right now."

"Anything interesting?"

"Thought I was a velociraptor for a second."

"Meh. Let's try not to mention any of these, okay?" said Goku. Nods of approval.

* * *

Tao and Raditz were in a cave in which some non-Turtle hermit had lived. It had only taken a few blasts of energy to frighten the previous owner out. Afterward, they had rearranged the furniture for double occupancy.

"Very good, Raditz! It's only been two days, but you've managed to control your temper for that long... and that's a start," said Tao out of nowhere at one point. No response from stared at each other over a meal of rice and boiled nondescript fish. Tao had doled out a much larger portion for Raditz.

"If you want to beat Goku, then you'll have to keep your temper down."

More silence. Then, Raditz knocked over the table. It smashed into a wall.

"Why won't you show me the respect I deserve? I'm a Saiyan warrior, not your son!" He jumped at Tao, both of them slammed to the ground, followed by some hurried grappling. Tao drew the knife concealed in his "cannon" arm.

*What is going on with this fellow?* Tao thought to himself.

"I hate you! I hate you and your superiority complex! I hate your rules and... I really, really, hate your stupid ugly face!" shouted Raditz. "And I'm leaving! I'm the strongest person on this planet and I don't need your help!" He released Tao from his stranglehold, got up, and started walking towards the entrance to the cave.

Tao stood up and brushed the dust off his robes.

"Sure, leave. You won't last long in a world with Goku and his friends," he shouted back.

"Yes I will!"

Outside the cave, Raditz inhaled fresh air.

*Needs more blood. And pain.* He thought. He jumped into the air, soaring up hundreds of feet in the grand Dragon Ball tradition. A small town was to the north.

*I think I'll wipe that place off the earth.* And he raised his hands.

*I wonder...*

"Ka... me... ha... me..." he announced, essentially ordering blue hued energies to gather around his hands.  
"Ha... me- ARGH!" Apparently repeating the second set of syllables exponentially increased the energy output, making it a bit too much to handle for Raditz. The energy spread outwards from his hands, creating shockwaves that, at the very least, would disrupt life in the town below him.

*What Tao doesn't realize is that I have the element of surprise-* Apparently people had noticed Raditz's attempt to annihilate the town, as little bursts of gunfire were coming in his direction.

*Bah. I'll destroy them later.* And he soared off. Eventually, he found himself hovering over a pack of giant boars.

*I don't understand why Tao bothers with store bought food when there's feasts roaming the plains.* He swooped down, eventually bringing himself to the height of the boars - they were taller than him, and probably weighed far more.

The plan was simple - lift a boar a hundred feet into the air, then drop it. Therefore, even Raditz could wrap his mind around it... and implement it - the boar died instantly upon landing.

Unlike Goku, Raditz preferred his meat raw.

* * *

"Rise and shine, Mr-"

A middle aged man was sitting in a train. Therefore, the rest of Kami's group was in a train.

"None of you are Mr. Freeman."

"Well, I'm Kami, and..." he looked at himself. Now, instead of a slimy space alien, he was a scaly one. He still had only one eye, but it was solid red. His legs had joints in the back, he had an extra arm growing out of his chest, and the words he had said were distorted and barely intelligible.

"This Piccolo, you think of... he has become a Vortigaunt, am I right?" the strange man said.

"... Where is Piccolo, anyways?"


	4. Seizing The Weapon

Piccolo didn't know where he was, and despite the link with Kami, did not realize he had become a Vortigaunt.

"Where is everybody?" He took in his surroundings - seemed he was in an underground sewer of toxic waste. Strange squidfaced aliens were firing globs of corrosive saliva at random locales. These were bullsquids - they were likely responsible for the damage that nearby structures were recieving. In addition, many of the pipes were showing signs of age, and one was missing a section as if it was chewed out.

"This place is a dump." Further peering implied he was standing on a platform, and to travel, he would have to swim through the lake of toxins.

Meanwhile, Kami was explaining his motives to the stranger.

"Yeah, we wouldn't want them taking over our universe. It'd suck," said Goku, attempting to reinforce Kami's case.

"I see. It just so happens that this train is heading to a place near the Lambda complex, where they... happen to have prepared something you may find useful. However, you will find the place to be quite in disarray, due to the... unforeseen consequences of certain experiments." responded the stranger.

"What do you mean by that?" asked Kami.

"I am not ...at liberty to divulge that information."

"Why not-"

"We are arriving at the location."

In the short run, this would turn out to be true, and Kami's entourage found their train stopping at a warzone. Unusually, the automated announcement system was still functioning.

"Please do not leave your seats until the train has stopped moving completely. Have a wonderful stay at Black Mesa."

And so the door opened, allowing Kami's entourage to exit. The strange man followed him.

"What's your name, anyways?" asked Krillin.

"You are not capable of comprehending it. However, I have been called the G-Man. The reasoning for this is in itself incomprehensible, and involves something called a 'Golden Source'."

Krillin merely stared at the G-Man.

"I will guide you to what you require. There are many strange and wonderful sights to see here-"

"Will there be any food?" Yajirobe inquired.

"... There are vending machines scattered throughout the facilities."

*Why did I come along on this trip?* thought Yajirobe.

They had entered the control room. It was damaged, to say the of the monitors were malfunctioning, cracked, and so forth. A security guard had collapsed at a receptionist's desk, apparently from mild case of fatal blood loss. Perhaps it was the huge chunk of ceiling nearby,but more likely, at some point, he'd been savaged by something.

"You should stay alert," the G-Man offered. "We shall be going through many offices, and those who fall behind may be assaulted by headcrabs."

"Headcrabs?" asked Goku.

"They latch onto your head and try to kill you. It is not a very pleasant experience."

"I'm sure it isn't," quipped Kami.

They eventually found themselves in a warehouse. A sign on a wall proclaimed "HAZARDOUS MATERIALS", and judging from the chemicals dripping from a hole in the ceiling and carving a hole in the floor beneath it, Goku and friends probably would benefit from handling things with care.

Above them, Piccolo had found out that Vortigaunts can fire energy beams - entirely firsthand experience. It so happened that a bullsquid had turned on him, and he did what came naturally - clasp his hands (now claws) to form an energy beam.

It was quicker, more instantaneous, and greener than he would expect, but it did dispose of the bullsquid. It also exposed Piccolo to his hands. They didn't look right, and there was a third one protruding from his chest. He stared at it for a moment.

"Well, it's better being scaly than slimy and ridden with tentacles... I guess."

Below him, the entourage had found a crowbar.

"You should leave that. For reasons unknown, the increased impact of the crowbar would actually be less effective than your bare hands," said the G-Man."

"Er, what?" Goku said.

"For that matter, don't pick up anything unless I tell you to."

Yajirobe quickly concealed a can of soda.

As they traveled, the lobby they were in gave way to an office complex, then to storage rooms, then to rooms full of heavy machinery, and finally, in a place where an unidentifable slurry was being reconstituted into cubes and the smell of raw sewage was beginning to grate on them, there was an elevator. They went down.

"What's that horrible smell?" asked Krillin.

"Yeah. For once it isn't Yajirobe," Senbei quipped. Yajirobe was about to punch him in the face, but the door of the elevator opened, and they found themselves staring at (suprisingly enough) raw sewage. Then the smell hit them. Goku projectile vomited into a passing stream of the stuff.

"Yay! This means I can eat more at dinner!" Goku shouted, jumping up and down with glee. Everyone rolled their eyes at him.

"Now, I must warn you that many creatures have entered these sewers due to some recent misfortune. They will most likely attack us on sight-

A large chunk of ceiling had suddenly come loose, followed by a shower of sewage and various mutated creatures. Even as it fell, various animals were jumping off and launching themselves at the group with every sharp edge bared. But one elected to remain on the falling ceiling and stare at the group with its one giant eye.

The chunk of ceiling plunged into the river of sludge, and soon became a raft, carrying its sole occupant to unknown locations.

"It appears your friend has turned up. I am guessing that this is... a wonderous reunion for you all."

Maybe it was.

* * *

Back in Springfield, a man named Charles Montgomery Burns had somehow emitted a large beam of energy through the window of his office.

"Did you see that, Smithers? I was dictating a letter and when I uttered the subjects name... THAT happened!" he said, pointing to the now broken windows and the shards of glass on the floor.

"Do you think you could do it again, sir?" Smithers responded.

"Oh, I don't know. You wouldn't expect cupping your hands and shouting, 'Kamehameha' would-"... but it did cause Mr. Burns to emit massive amounts of energy again, for whatever reason in the directions of Moe's Tavern.

"How delightful. It's just like that computer game with the person who runs and jumps! I think I'll call it the 'Nuclear Power Beam' or such."

"Do you think I could do it?"

"Try all you like, Smithers, but I don't think you can-" A third energy beam went out the window.

"I don't believe it! You said the words that must not be said!"

Smithers was silent.

"This could be the most important weapon in the history mankind, since Alfred Nobel stablized nitroglycerin!" And so, Mr. Burns walked to his broken window and cupped his hands.

"And so, Springfield, I usher in a new age of terror when I say unto you... kame hame ha!"

This time, the energy wave was intentionally aimed at Moe's Tavern. Fortunately for its customers, nobody was in it at the time. Unfortunately for them, they were moments away from being such. Suffice it to say that the first blast had wrecked the place. When Moe Syzlak unlocked and opened the doors, he was confronted with the ceiling, which had fallen in on the floor and destroyed it.

He was unable to speak, or even move for the next half hour. Then Homer pulled in with his buddies, Lenny and Carl.

"Moe, the bar's broken! Fix it!" shouted Homer.

"Yeah, we're going to have to drink our beer in can form!" added Carl.

At this point, Burns had fired a second beam at the tavern. It moved slow enough that they could see where it came from, and jump haphazardly out of its way, as if in an action movie. This time, the walls of Moe's crumbled.

"That's it. Burns has terrorized this town for long enough! I'm taking him down!" shouted Homer, scrambling back into his car.

"Wait, Homer... don't you work for him?" asked Moe.

"Not as much as I used to! Now I need beer, so you should come along. And I'll need friends, so Lenny and Carl also need to get in the car."

It got Homer's friends into his car, for sure.

* * *

The creatures attacking Kami's entourage were, to say the least, unremarkable fighters. Therefore, the group completely dominated them.

"I'm not sure whether I should be congratulate Chi-Chi for singlehandedly destroying all of the creatures, or slowly backing away in horror..." said Krillin.

"Well, it's obvious that they're very little threat to us," offered Kami.

Chi Chi was slowly ripping the tendrils off a bullsquid. Somehow, it wasn't dead, but it was in more pain than it deserved.

"Uh, Chi Chi? The group's leaving without you," said Goku. She glared at him for a moment, then slapped him with one of the tendrils.

"Ow." Then he snapped out of it. "Can't you take it with you?"

Chi Chi statred at him as if he was a headcrab. Then she reconsidered.

"What do you know? I can take him with me." She picked up the slowly writhing, horribly injured bullsquid and took it with her.

"You know, we should probably pick up that one eyed you thing, just in case it happens to be Piccolo," muttered Goku to Kami.

"Don't worry about him." Kami pointed to the raft. It had jammed where the river narrowed and entered a pipe. It had also formed a landbridge, but the Vortigaunt had declined to move.

"Hey! Piccolo! If that's you, come over here!" shouted Goku.

"I have no idea why we trust that thing," Chi Chi muttered.

"Well, Kami says it's okay, and Kami is a good guy, and I trust him."

Then, Chi Chi didn't know what to think or feel, so she fell over.

"I'm as wary as you guys are, but Kami seems to be able to keep Piccolo under control... and that's got to count for something. Am I right?" said Krillin.

Piccolo had rejoined the group.

"Tell me, what did Piccolo ever do to you?" asked the G-Man.

"He tried to conquer our planet, and when Goku killed him, he came back and tried to do it again... except that time, Goku didn't kill him."

"I guess that might lead to a grudge."

They continued onwards - the sewers, after many ladders and small leaps, and some pushing of metal canisters, lead to another storage room.

"We are getting very close," the G-Man said.

"Uh, don't look now, but a group of soldier types are shooting people in white coats," said Senbei.

"So that explains the weird ripping sounds and thuds I was hearing!" Kami responded.

"Not so loud-"

But it was too late. The group had run in with the Hazardous Environment Combat Unit of the US Marine Corps, which was charged with clearing the facility of aliens, security, and Gordon Freeman.

Suddenly, voices. "We have eight unconfirmed entrances, two Vortigaunts, the rest humans. Give them the standard procedure."

Another voice cut in.  
"Acknowledged. Aggressive fire engaged." Followed by hundreds of bullets in the group's general direction. Everyone immediately ran for cover - conveniently there was a room off to the side.

"Hey! That's not very nice of them!" Goku said. "You guys better stop shooting at us, or we'll have to defend yourselves!"

"Sir, the targets disapprove of our actions," said the second voice.

"Negotiate with your weapons." After a few footsteps, a grenade landed outside the side room. Before anyone could react, it exploded, knocking the people off their feet.

"MOVE! Move in!" The footsteps got louder, then three people dressed in inappropriate environmental fatigues (off-green compared to the grey concrete walls) rolled in and fired their machine guns. Unfortunately for them, Kami's entourage was, per DBZ standards, unbelievably agile and capable of dodging the hundreds of bullets fired at them, and even grabbing some of them out of the air. When the barrage stopped, Goku was holding over a dozen bullets in his hands. Others were relatively distinguished - Krillin had picked up eight, Piccolo had grabbed five (all in the central arm of his Vortigaunt form), and even Senbei, completely untrained in combat, had managed to catch one. He kept looking at his hand, and back at the soldiers for a few seconds.

"Stop trying to hurt us. It's mean!" Goku shouted, before launching himself at the troops - a few quick blows to the arms and legs left the three soldiers immobilized and thoroughly unconscious.

"They aren't nearly as dangerous as one would think," said Krillin.

"Dangerous? They shot at us! I didn't sign up for this, or anything like it!" Yajirobe shouted.

"A shame. You look like you could hold your own against a fairly large group," quipped the G-Man. "We should continue onward."

They did. Eventually, the G-Man motioned for them to stop.

"The weapon Kami seeks is in front of us, but it is protected by an... impenetrable web of laser tripmines. I would not suggest trying to dodge the explosions."

"How do they work?" asked Krillin.

"When one walks into the path of the laser, the device explodes."

"Simple enough." He stared at the mines for a moment.

"Everybody stand back. I have an idea," said Senbei, who pulled out a sealed bowl of rice.

"Can I eat it?" Goku asked.

"Sorry, but no."

"Aw."

"I think we could trigger the tripmines from a distance with this bowl. Then, if the weapon's rugged enough, we'd be able to get at it," explained Senbei.

"Might as well try it," said Krillin, furitively backing up a few steps. And so, the rice was lobbed at the tripmines. Senbei was right - it triggered the mines and caused a series of explosions. He was also lucky, as the the gun the mines were guarding seemed to be unscathed as a result of the explosion.

Several dozen feet away, Gordon Freeman heard a muffled explosion, and thought nothing of it.

Senbei then walked over to the gun and picked it up. "What's this thing do, anyways?" he asked.

"This is a gravity gun. Through means that are beyond your science, it creates fields around objects that allows one to manipulate it from a distance. The button on the left pushes an object with an energy blast, and the other allows one to move about objects as if they had telekinetic powers," responded the G-Man. "Be warned that it can not pick up organic objects for some reason, although they still can be pushed."

"This is why we are traveling to alternate universes, in case you ask," Kami said. "We'll head back now," he announced after a while - the group traveled back on its previous course.

"... we can travel to alternate universes, but we don't have energy weapons," muttered Krillin.

"It's always possible that someone like Bulma might end up making one. Doesn't she always end up churning crazy inventions out?"

"Actually, she's more of an engineer. If you want crazy things, you go to her father. But Bulma usually makes the more practical stuff."

"That reminds me... What is Dr. Brief's first name?" Kami inquired to nobody in particular.

"You know, he might not have one any more," said Goku.

"Wait, what?"

"He probably had it surgically removed." Cue massive, deafening silence from the others.

"You have some... interesting ideas," said the G-Man, when they had reached the sewers.

"Thanks, man!"

Soon, they were at lobby that they had come in.

"This is where we part," said the G-Man.

"Well, I guess it was nice knowing you," said Senbei.

More awkward silence, as they left the lobby and went entered the tram.

"I assume that this will turn back into our plane, or at least a facsimile of it once we get back to our universe," said Kami.

"What if it doesn't?" said Chi-Chi.

"Well, we'll still be back home, safe and sound... and not turned into hellish creatures."

"Good... because if we weren't, I'd have to stab you. Then I'd stab Piccolo... then I might slap around Yajirobe a bit, and then I don't know what I'd do."

Kami ignored the outburst, merely triggering the reality traversing device, which of yet, had no catchy name.

"Is there any way we could get rid of these red flashes of alternate realities? They're frightening," said Yajirobe.

"I'll look into it."

Fortunately for the group, they returned home safely, Kami's vehicle became a plane, and overall, their mission had went well. The G-Man, on the other hand, had yet to decide how much of a role he was to play in the Black Mesa incident.

* * *

Raditz, on the other hand, having managed to pick up some of Tao's lessons and apply them, had become, overall, the more powerful of the two. Therefore, Tao was getting his ass kicked whenever Raditz felt a burst of anger, pride, whatnot. Of course, this was very frequent.

"If you keep doing that, I will have to train," said Tao.

"Hah, you'd never keep up with me. Besides, if you ever beat me, I'd just get more powerful," Raditz responded.

"You're still an idiot who had trouble beating someone with a fraction of your power level. According to the book, it got you killed."

"Stop bringing up the book!"

"Without the book, you wouldn't know how to act."

Raditz merely scowled at Tao.

*What I don't understand is why he acts so childish,* Tao thought to himself. *For a proclaimed Saiyan warrior, he's rather inept.*

*Stupid Tao. He thinks he's so strong and cool, but he doesn't know that I plan to kill him.* thought Raditz. It was a wonder that neither of them were dead yet.


	5. When The Walls Crumbled

On another planet, Vegeta and Nappa were devouring food at an immense rate.

"Why did we stop here, anyways? Don't we have a Kakarot and a Raditz to pluck?" asked Nappa.

"It's very simple. We are not only fighters... we are also gourmands and must sample the foods of every planet we consider laying waste to."

"You've gone soft, Vegeta."

"Saiyans have to eat."

And it was at this point that Vegeta tore into the food (a sort of cattle offal) with renewed gusto.

"I've got a theory... we should force this planet into servitude and make it our personal refrigerator," he suggested between mouthfuls.

"What? Blasphemy!"

"A Saiyan demands a hundred pounds of food a day. When he can consistently get it, his power expands far more quickly."

"It's more likely you'll become a fat bastard before you become a Super Saiyan." This remark earned Nappa a quick porcelain dish to the head.

"That was uncalled for." And Vegeta ate the last of the offal.

"Next time, I'll make sure they don't cook the meat," he said. "Make a note of this planet. We'll take over after we deal with Kakarot."

"Alright, we've dined. What now?"

"We dash." Seconds later, they had exited the restaurant. when the waiter serving them came by, there was no sign of the Saiyans.

"That's it. If everyone leaves without paying for their food, then I'm quitting."

* * *

One uneventful return later, Goku and friends were back in the Dragon World.

"Sure is nice being a Namek instead of god knows what," muttered Piccolo.

"What's a Namek?" Goku asked him.

"Iuno. Kami always is thinking about them. Apparently they're other creatures like us."

"What were those weird things you were always making when you were King Piccolo?"

"Uh..."

"Alright, I'm going to work out. Got any trucks around?"

"Why don't you ask Dr. Brief for something in a capsule?" said Krillin.

"Hey, that's a good idea!" And he flew off.

Dr. Brief was, surprisingly, quite willing to lend Goku some heavy objects.

"A large tank of water... a tank of sand... a full scale M1 Abrams replica... that should keep you occupied for a while," he said, handing the small capsules to Goku.

"Thanks, man! Say, how's Gohan doing?"

"He's studying."

"What's he been studying?"

"Chemistry. You might have to send him to a school - he had a question about metallurgy that neither I or my daughter could answer."

"You'll have to talk to my wife about that. Where is Gohan, anyways?"

"He's in the rec room, watching this weird cartoon."

Gohan was, in fact, watching a bizarre cartoon about a boy named Ichigo.

"Hey, Gohan!"

"Dad!"

"What's that you're watching? It looks kind of cool."

"It's called Bleach. It's about this guy who turns into something called a 'Soul Reaper' and fights against bad people."

"Sounds cool." He sat down for a few minutes, during which the protagonist talked to other people, then delivered severe beatings to them.

"Dad? Your hair looks weird all of a sudden," said Gohan during a commercial break (something about a human and a bear going to a different planet and causing mayhem).

Goku ran his hair through the spikes. Unfortunately, his hands lacked eyes, so he was unable to determine what his son was talking about.

"They feel right."

"Yeah, but they're a lot brighter than usual."

Then, Goku realized there was a mirror in the room, and he stared at himself for a moment.

"Hey, it's not black anymore - in fact, it's turned brown... no wait, it's black again." He stared for a second. "Maybe it was something I ate."

"Who knows."

"Well, I'm going to train now. See you at dinner."

It was without fanfare that Goku broached the capsules and started lifting the tanks. They were rather heavy, but Goku was capable of handling several thousand pounds. This occupied him for quite a while. Eventually he stopped and traveled back to his home, only to find Kami at the front door.

"Hello, Goku. I'd enter your home, but I'm afraid your wife might kill me," he said.

"Why didn't she do it when we were on the plane?" asked Goku.

"I don't know. But did you see what she did to that bullsquid? I need to stay on her good side, otherwise I might die slowly and horribly."

"Uh, right. What are you doing here, anyways?"

"It's very simple. Tao's ambitions, as well as our attempts at preventing them, are beginning to cause problems with the fabric of reality itself."

"What's in it for me?"

"... Er... if the people we meet on our travels start throwing Kamehameha waves at us for no apparent reason, we might be able to enlist their help."

"Why would that happen?"

"My theory is that our universe is leaking into theirs, but it makes no sense. Mr. Popo has his own theories, but I don't believe him."

"What's he think?"

"Unfortunately am I not at liberty to say. However, he told me that if you can work out the secret of this..." (and here Kami drew a small jewel case out of his robes) "... then you will have an idea of what he thinks is happening."

Goku stared at it.

"On... the... seventh... day... God... created Master? English isn't my first language, but..."

"I have to go now," said Kami, who shuffled away.

* * *

Moe, Homer, Lenny, and Carl had burst into Burn's office.

"Excuse me, but could you please stand on the trap door? We are busy here," said Mr. Burns.

"Oh no you don't! You destroyed Moe's Tavern, and it's time to pay the price!" shouted Homer.

"And why should I care about your filthy hovel, with its regulars who seek to drown themselves in alcohol and escape their sorrows?"

At this point, Homer lunged at Mr. Burns.

* * *

"The tracking device you put on the Simpson fellow is working suprisingly well," said Mr. Popo, when Kami asked for a sitrep from the safety of his lookout.

"Think we should tell him some day?" Kami asked.

"No, he'd probably try to destroy it."

"Right. If my theories are true, then people should be exhibiting massively increased strength, agility, energy output, and maybe an obsession with power."

* * *

Homer wasn't prepared for the massive surge of power that the 'leak' was providing. Therefore, he had jumped so high that his head had penetrated the ceiling.

"I can see my house from here!" he shouted, muffled by plaster. His attempts to extricate himself were, in spite of his massively enhanced strength, quite feeble.

"Good thing I brought my shotgun," said Moe, wielding it, and drawing a bead on Burns. He slowly brought his hands up.

*Wait, Mr. Burns isn't strong enough to put his arms over his head-*

"KAMEHAMEHA!" Moe was enveloped by blue light that managed to push him out of the room.

"It seems that I not only have all the cards in play... but I also have learned how to cheat," cackled Mr. Burns. At this point, Homer had managed to loosen his head from plaster and then fell back onto the floor. He got to his feet and stared at Burns with defiance that he only rarely displayed. At this point, Lenny and Carl ran after Smithers, who immediately assumed a defensive position - fists in front of the face, like a boxer.

Lenny took Smithers' left, and Carl took his right. The impacts of the tackles brought them all to the ground, where Smithers immediately put Lenny in a chokehold, despite Carl's repeated punches to his stomach. They rolled around a bit - eventually Lenny and Carl ended up hitting each other, while Smithers had slithered out of their grasp.

"Ow! That was uncalled for, Lenny!" shouted Carl after getting socked in the jaw.

"Sorry." They got up, dusted themselves off, and went for Smithers again.

Burns launched another Kamehameha at Homer, but it missed by a mile, landing in Burns's security TVs. They promptly exploded.

"Ha! You aim like a little girl!" shouted Homer.

Smithers ran at him and jabbed at each of Homer's elbows, disabling his arms for a few seconds. Homer merely kicked Smithers with his newfound strength into the other side of the room, where he passed out.

Moe had reentered the office.

"If you try to launch another one of those blue energy drinks, I will shoot you before you can say, 'Ka-me-ha-me-ha" - whagh!" Moe was now able to perform the move, as the unorganized energy blasting from his hands demonstrated. The shotgun dropped, discharged, damaged a stuffed bear statue that Burns had owned for thirty years. A few seconds later, he regained his composure, and picked the gun up.

"Uh oh." Burns suddenly dropped his hands and tried to shuffle away. He was very quickly surrounded, with a shotgun looking him in the eyes, a Lenny immobilizing his legs, a Carl immobilizing his arms, and a Homer making demands of him.

"You destroyed my favorite bar!" he shouted.

"Oh, so you're admitting you're an alcoholic?" said Burns.

"... why you big- that's not the point!"

"What do you want?"

Homer stared at him. After a few seconds, his facial expressions tend towards fear.

"Oh no! I don't know!"

Moe rolled his eyes.

"Either you rebuild my bar, or I fill you with lead," he whispered in Burns's left ear.

"... Alright... if you let me stand up, I could perhaps chip in a few bricks..."

"Fine." They let go of Mr. Burns, who slowly stood up, and shuffled over to his desk.

"Don't release the hounds, okay?" said Lenny.

* * *

"As you can see, our incantations have also made their way into their world," Kami explained to Mr. Popo, who was operating a complex piece of machinery dedicated towards peering into other worlds.

"That sounds very bad. You see, I did some research... that world is one of many to have people named Kamehameha; most notably, a Hawaiian king." Mr. Popo's hands crackled slightly, but nothing came of it.

Kami nodded at Mr. Popo's implicatures.

"Also, it is very easy to create the energy blasts - neither of the subjects were aware of their newfound powers, so they had no chance of predicting the results," continued Mr. Popo.

"Let me guess. That world is doomed once someone does a report on the fellow."

"Yes, that makes sense."

"Oh well. I'd best find a way to help Goku and his friends train themselves." And Kami shuffled off.

* * *

"You know, I've seen things you'll never see," said Nappa in his space capsule, during a brief moment of lucidity.

"Yeah, sure, whatever," responded Vegeta, who was, at best, half-awake.

"You're always all bravado and rage and 'My power level is higher than yours, Nappa!', but when you've been as many places I have, seen so much carnage, you begin to think there might be more to life than making a number bigger-"

"And this is why you will always be the weaker one, Nappa! I have my doubts about you ever reaching the level of a Super Saiyan."

"I've been places where the best warriors were but a fraction of my power level, but their strategic ability would make Frieza wet himself."

"You keep telling me this crap that I already know."

"You don't know! This one time, I was on what we thought was an uninhabited planet. I had two underlings with me. You remember Tormato and Sphinat?"

"No. And they're dead. So what?"

"Well, Frieza thought that a Super Namek was hiding in a forest on that planet, so he sent us to exterminate it. We never found that Super Namek - Zarbon told us it might've died in a freak accident, but we found something far worse-"

"What could be worse than a Super Namek? A Super Saiyan?"

"... In that forest, I saw a vast gathering of hellish creatures, all of on which the words "Carson Dellosa" were imprinted. It was not that they looked hellish - in fact, they were sickeningly sweet creatures, all with straight lines beginning to resemble ordinary creatures, yet between their sugared grins and identical faces, I could sense malevolence that, if applied, could cause the extinction of all life!"

"Why didn't you just destroy them?"

"We tried! Whenever one would face us in head on combat, they would die so quickly we almost felt sorry for them. But they almost never did... they would attack from the shadows, throwing cloying, vitrolic poison at us. They would set areas of the forest on fire while we were asleep... they were diabolical geniuses, and one day... I did the right thing..."

"You destroyed the entire forest, right?"

"... yes. My companions were in there, and they had no idea, but there's no way the abominations could survive that!"

"They crumpled like paper. Why didn't you do that in the first place?"

"Because our orders were to capture the Namek, not to kill him... idiot. Frieza wanted a specimen to experiment with."

"What? Were we not powerful enough for his tastes?"

"I don't know, he never told us why."

* * *

"So what are you supposed to do with this plastic thingy?" Goku asked his son, who was peering at the disc that Kami had provisioned the family with.

"That's a compact disc. You put it in our computer and you can access the data within."

"Okay, where's our computer?" asked Goku.

"At home. Why don't you ask Dr. Brief if you can borrow his for a while?"

"Alright then." And Goku shuffled off.

* * *

At approximately the same time, somewhere north of Vladivostok, Yamcha, Tien Shinhan, and Chiaotzu were training.

"We need to up the ante. If we can't at least keep up with Krillin, we're going to be useless," Tien Shinhan said over a meal of egg noodles.

"How are we going to do that?" asked Yamcha.

"Goku once told me that when he was training under Master Roshi, he wore a heavy turtle shell to increase the amount of work his muscles did. We should probably do something like that."

"What do we lift?" Chiaotzu inquired.

"Well, I heard that they recently knocked down an old warehouse at he local port. We should... salvage some of the steel from the foundations." What do you say to that?"

"Sounds like a good idea," said Yamcha.

An hour later, they were the happy owners of brand new bars of steel.

"Guess we need to tie these around around ourselves," muttered Chiaotzu. He started sifting through the property of their cottage for such. There was no rope in the cottage.

"No luck? I guess we're going to be playing catch with these things for a while," Tien quipped.

"Well, it sure beats screaming 'WOLF FANG FIST' at the top of your lungs for hours on end," quipped Yamcha.


	6. Rainey Street Rumble

On Rainey Street, the people were arguably good, decent people. They had their prejudices and their cognitive dissonance, but they tried, and if they were lucky, they succeeded slightly more often than other suburban neighborhoods did. Therefore, when everyone had suddenly manifested immense increases in their physical capabilities, nobody had tried to kill each other - it was as much common sense as ethics keeping them in check. For the most part, they ignored their powers, except when their utility was needed.

For instance, this made it easier for Hank Hill to work on the underside of his truck - he could lift it, place it in a raised stand, and gain the benefits of going to a Jiffy-Lube in the comfort of his own neighborhood. His friends watched, occasionally passing him tools.

"Are you sure you even need the truck anymore?" asked Bill Dauterive. "I'm just saying that you could probably haul more stuff faster with your new super strength and super speed..."

"I'm not Superman, Bill. Ford is not going to go out of business. Hand me a wrench." Bill offered one to Hank, and the truck was worked on.

* * *

"It's getting worse. Unless we find a way to fix the damage, we'll be seeing worse things than people getting stronger," said Mr. Popo.

"I already know that," Kami responded. "Any leads?"

"The simplest solution would be to kill Tao, but with Raditz guarding him, there's going to be problems."

"How do you know that Raditz is working with Tao?"

"He launched a trivial attack on a local village, and his energy output has multiplied several times over in recent times. Also, Tao isn't dead yet."

"God forbid that they learn how to travel through dimensions."

"Anyways, I'm picking up disturbances between our universe and another one... It's probably nothing, but if it isn't..."

"Keep an eye on it." And then Kami departed from his lookout. It was time to speak with the Kais.

* * *

"I feel strange all of a sudden," said Vegeta, during yet another rare moment where he and Nappa were both conscious.

"Must be all the crap you've eaten. If you vomit, you're going to be sleeping in your own shit for a few months. And I'm sure you want that," snarked Nappa.

"You wish. My digestive system feels fine. I'm a Saiyan prince - no meal shall fell me!"

Then, all of a sudden, a flash of red light. For a moment, Vegeta and Nappa thought they were cavemen. A second, brighter red flash, and they disappeared from their capsules, only to be replaced by two shadowy figures.

"What happened? It's awfully cramped in here." said one.

"Hell if I know. Dang'ol red flash and then I thought I was dead and then dang'ol second red flash and I'm here," said the other.

At that point, the life support systems in the capsules realized that neither of the passengers were Saiyans, and started re-calibrating its life support systems. This created a lot of light and noise. The passengers were momentarily frightened, but then a sedative was added to the air, and they passed out.

* * *

"What just happened?" said Vegeta, taking in his surroundings. He was no longer in space, unless in this dimension, space had air, gravity, and suburbs.

"Pass me a beer, Bill," said Hank.

"I'm not doing a damn thing, human," Vegeta snarled. Hank stared at him. The newcomer was obviously not Bill Dauterive. His outfit was outlandish, and his hairstyle even more so.

"Who are you?"

"First you will tell me where I am and why you dared bring me to this hellhole, and if your answer pleases me, Nappa and I won't kill you all."

"Now you listen here, mister. Show some respect, or I'll kick your ass!" Hank stared at the interlopers. They were standing exactly where Bill and Boomhauer had been standing. Nappa was even holding the beer that Bill had been drinking.

"Where's Bill? Where's Boomhauer? Answer me!"

"How are we supposed to know where your stupid friends are?" shouted Nappa.

"Hank, I don't like this... these guys look like they want a fight," Dale Gribble muttered.

"Not particularly. We're just here to ravage your planet and enjoy its cuisine," said Vegeta. Nappa slapped him.

"We're going to kill everyone on this entire planet."

"Aw, Nappa! We don't have our capsules anymore! How are we going to get anywhere without them?"

"Alright, fine, we'll wait until we get a spaceship before we kill everybody."

"Nobody is dying here today, but I'm going to kick your ass!" It was at this point that Hank charged at Nappa and punched him in the kidneys. Nappa needed a moment to recover from his shock. Then, he roundhouse kicked Hank in the stomach, before jabbing him a few times with his knee.

"WHAT DOES THE SCOUTER SAY ABOUT HIS POWER LEVEL, VEGETA?," shouted Nappa at his companion. Vegeta examined it.

"IT SAYS HE SELLS PROPANE AND PROPANE ACCESSORIES!" he responded.

"What?" shouted Nappa again. Hank took advantage of Nappa's second moment of shock by pinning him to the ground.

"For god's sake, Vegeta. If you're not going to attack him, at least attack someone else!"

Vegeta spat on the ground. A quick search of the premises revealed only a Dale Gribble attempting to sneak away. Instead of succeeding, he was tackled, and punched several times in the jaw.

"I guess I'll just have to use the Garlic Gun on the strong one," Vegeta muttered, before clasping his hands to gather energy. Hank was too occupied with kicking Nappa's ass to notice.

* * *

"Well, the rift should close in a minute or so," said Mr. Popo. "I don't know if the problem will fix itself, or if we have to call some sort of handyman god."

"I think King Kai knows how to fix dimensional rifts. No guarantees, though. Want me to call him?" Kami responded.

"You might as well."

"Alright then... where'd I put the phone that goes to the other world?"

"I connected the line into your cellphone so you could conference call King Yemma and Krillin a few years back."

"Funny. I don't remember that." He picked up his cell phone, dialed a number... didn't press the call button.

"How long do we wait?" he asked.

"About 90 more seconds in the worst case." Mr. Popo stared at a new disturbance on the monitors.

"This can't be it... it's got to be something else-"

Suddenly, Mr. Popo and Kami saw a flash of bright red light, after which they found themselves in a world of primary colors, straight lines, and simple logic puzzles.

"How many colors do you see, Kami?" asked Mr. Popo.

"Only 256... what's up with that?"

"Something's wrong with this place. It's as if this universe is very small, so the gods quantized everything in an attempt to fit more stuff in-" Mr. Popo was interrupted by a high pitched voice.

"Can you make the missing bird?" they heard behind their backs. They slowly turned... three birds distinguishable by their hats, body patterning, and color seemingly greeted them.

"... I thought this place was only a tale my mother told in order to frighten me into behaving?" Mr. Popo whispered, trembling slightly.

"Uh... I think we need to press buttons on this machine," mumbled Kami. A few quick presses, three birds became four.

"Thanks a lot!" they said. Then, the floor beneath them gave out, and they dropped into an unseen abyss.

"See you later!" shouted one, its voice echoing out of the black chamber."

Mr. Popo screamed. Then, another flash of red light - Kami and Mr. Popo were back at the safety of the lookout.

"That... was absolutely terrifying," Kami shudderspoke.

"You have no idea."

* * *

An interval of 20 minutes found Vegeta, instead of killing the residents of Rainey Street, eating a propane grilled burger. Nappa's right eyelid was twitching.

"You can't kill someone who makes such a good burger!" said Vegeta to Hank.

"Well, you shouldn't kill people anyways, but as you can see, propane allows you to taste the meat, not the heat," Hank responded.

"Hank, they tried to kill us!" shouted Dale. "Please don't tell me you trust them!"

"I don't know why I do. Maybe it's the respect gained from a hard battle. It takes me back to my old football days." Hank thought back to the fight.

* * *

It was long and bloody. He'd just been hit by Vegeta's "Garlic Gun". Something within him had changed.

"I've got it! Garlic on hamburgers!" he managed to say, before Vegeta punched him to the ground.

"What's wrong with you?" snarled Vegeta.

"Nothing! I've just had the best idea of all time!"

"Blasphemy! I've had ketchup on a hamburger, I've had onions, I've had mustard, and too many vegetables to describe! Only a fool would dare add garlic to a burger! I ought to kill you on the spot for such idiocy!"

"If you get off of me, I'll prove my point."

"Never!" And Vegeta punched Hank in the mouth for such a thought. Then a smell hit his nostrils. Vegeta took a moment to savor it (ground beef), and lost any initiative he had in the next 30 seconds. Now he was on the ground, and Hank was about to walk away and call the police.

"...what is that smell?" Vegeta's weak voice wafted to Hank.

"It's the burgers. They've just finished cooking."

"I haven't eaten in 36 hours..." said Vegeta.

*That's a damn lie, and he knows it...* Nappa thought.

"If you offer me food, I'll never bother you again..." added Vegeta, introducing pathos into his voice.

*That's also a lie... I hope.*

"Why should I listen to a word you say? You threatened to kill every person on this planet!"

"Okay, okay! It was a joke! I wouldn't kill anyone! My companion and I have a fairly warped sense of humor..."

*If that's not a lie, then I'll kill him!* Nappa almost said, but he managed to supress the urge and merely thought it.

"I'm normally not a forgiving person, but Reverend Strupp has been delievering so many sermons on mercy and pacificsm that I might as well spare you. However..." and here, Hank's iron voice solidified into steel, "...if you do it again, you'll get thrown in prison."

Hank sighed. "Besides, my friends Boomhauer and Bill are missing for the duration, and I might need your help in finding them."  
"Yes, I understand. I'll try to control my tongue."

"Alright then."

* * *

Vegeta was about to shove the last piece of burger into his face, when suddenly he saw a red flash.

"I DON'T WANT TO MAKE A FEATHERED FRIEND, GODAMMIT-" A second flash, and he disappeared, finding himself in his capsule. It appeared that Nappa was in his own capsule. Both began recalibrating their life support for Saiyans.

"What the hell is wrong with you?" shouted Nappa over his capsule's radio after a few seconds.

"Nappa! Control yourself! It's easier to backstab someone when they think you're their friend," Vegeta responded.

"Why didn't you just kill him on the spot?"

"... Were you even there, Nappa? You just stood there, like an idiot!"

"I determined that you did not need assistance. Then you talked your way out of it..." Nappa spat at the wall of his cabin. "You're a terrible Saiyan prince."

"Yes, and I'm sure you'd like to tell the others that you lost to a 'terrible Saiyan'. I'm far more powerful. They wouldn't be impressed."

"There aren't any others! Kakarott is too infantile to care, and Raditz doesn't matter anyways."

"Haven't you been watching the movies? There's at least 2 Saiyans out there that could be of use to us!"

"Oh, great. First you spare an enemy, then you make up gibberish about something called a movie! The great prince Vegeta is surely going mad!"

* * *

"So wait, how often are people learning things they shouldn't know?" said Kami a few minutes after his "dimensional warp".

"Uh... cross-pollination is happening on a somewhat frequent basis. I don't have the exact number," Mr. Popo responded.

"You're still on edge after what just happened. I can tell."

"I'm not the only one." Mr. Popo stared off into space for a long while.

"Say, do you think we might benefit from this?" said Kami after some time.

"Gain some new information via this unexplained mechanism? It's theoretically possible."

* * *

Boomhauer and Bill Dauterive were sleeping on Hank's lawn. Bill had a chunk of hamburger on his forehead. Had Hank known that they were essentially unharmed by the experience, he wouldn't have shook them so violently.

"Boomhauer! Bill! Wake up! Are you guys okay?" he shouted. Bill opened his eyes.

"I'm fine, Hank. Kind of drowsy, though." Bill's hand ran over his head. He felt the hamburger chunk and ate it.

"Not really sure what happened. I was in this sort of space capsule, and there was this timer... it said there were 3 months until they reached their destination... I don't know where it was. I think it was Earth. Then the thing pumped sleeping gas in my face, and, well, it made me sleepy."

"I'll be right back. I think Peggy might have some advice on the situation if I explain it to her." And Hank Hill entered his house.


	7. Real World Consequences

"Come on, Kami! Tell me when we're going to use the gravity gun! And who's going to use it, anyways?" Goku asked out of nowhere, when Kami made one of his infrequent visits.

"3 months, then our enemy should arrive. I haven't decided who will use the gun... it depends on who's at the blast sight first and doesn't already have insane powers," Kami responded.

"Bulma's already figured out how the thing works. Shouldn't we try and make more so that normal people like her can defend herself against Saiyans en masse?"

"That sounds like a good idea on the surface, but gravity can be an incredibly dangerous thing in the wrong hands. If we started manufacturing them, we'd probably tear up the earth."

"Iuno. Teach them how to fight?"

"We'll have to work on that. Tao and Raditz aren't the only threats, and frankly, you're not going to live forever."

"Aw."

"Trust me, eternal life has its flaws-"

Kami's cellphone started beeping.

"It's Kami," he said, after activating it.

"It's me, Tien Shinhan. The police say that a cyborg and a guy with knee length hair are attacking Kyoto prefecture. Their martial artists are trying to hold the two off, but they're getting destroyed."

"You'll want to get in on this," said Kami to Goku.

"I'm on it." He blasted into the air and flew away.

"I just sent Goku. He should be there in a few minutes," Kami told his phone.

"Alright. Find out anything useful?"

"Their strength has increased substantially over the last few months. Keep your wits about you. Good luck."

"Thanks, Kami." With that, Tien scanned the surroundings. Raditz was charging some sort of apocalyptic city-raping attack. It would keep him occupied for a while. Tao was slowly, but surely disposing of the martial artists with Dodun Rays. One shot apiece, and fifteen shots a minute.

It was time to disable Raditz with some sort of choke-hold to the neck.

* * *

Goku's mind was empty when he came upon Kyoto. No buildings had fallen, yet a few were on fire from stray energy beams, as was one unfortunate fellow with a large afro. He saw Tien Shinhan, who was looking worn, but managing to hold off Raditz and Tao. The remaining martial artists in the city now had the opportunity to snipe at their enemies, but their aim was terrible, and their rate of fire was rather low.

"There's no turning you, is there?" said Tien to Tao.

"Frankly, no. Not even for a trillion zeni." Tao snapped back.

"After I'm through with this planet, there won't be anything to back the currency," shouted Raditz.

"But we abandoned the gold standard a hundred years-" Raditz, remembering something of Tao's "training" (more accurately, beatings), jabbed his elbow in Tien's open mouth.

"Don't talk, just die," Tao quipped. Then he fell out of the air, as sharp pain assailed the back of his head.

"Your one liners are stupid, and so are you!" said Goku, hearty voice and jovial grin concealing any fury he had at Tao's ambitions.

"No, you're stupid!" Raditz said; then he slapped Goku on his left cheek. Goku stopped grinning, Raditz started.

"Well, you're mean!" shouted Goku, before starting the incantations - "Ka-me-ha-me... ow!" Raditz had hit him again, this time in his clasped hands. Goku's jaw dropped.

"Wow... nobody's ever done that before. You must be really strong!"

"Yes, I'm also modest," Raditz smirked, then kicking Goku in the knee.

"No matter. I'll still beat you!" It was at that point that Goku seemingly went berserk, unleashing a flurry of punches and kicks all over Raditz's body. One made contact with Raditzs' stomach. The sheer force of it slammed Raditz into the wall of a nearby slaughterhouse. Instead of retaliating, Raditz sniffed the air.

"... haven't... had... food... in 18 hours..." He smashed through the wall, was missing for a brief period, then came out. A strip of raw beef was hanging from his mouth. Then, using the first bits of energy from the cow carcass, he punched Goku harder than he had ever felt in his lifetime.

"Ow! That's the hardest anyone's ever hit me!" said Goku, stating what was obvious to us, but not necessarily to anyone else. Goku then launched another flurry of punches and kicks at Raditz.

"Come on, Tien! This guy is really mean and needs to be taught a lesson!"  
Tien was staring at a buxom lady, who was staring back at him.

"Er... uh.. what? Okay! DODUN RAY!" Said projectile glanced of Raditz's Saiyan armor. Raditz merely laughed at him. Two more projectiles in a short period. The second also glanced off the armor, but the third collided with the Saiyan's unprotected leg. It scorched off the skin, and a trickle of blood came out.

"You bastard! You made me bleed!" Raditz took off after Tien, who started wrapping around buildings in a rather convoluted fashion, hoping to confuse the Saiyan, and possibly gain another sneak attack.

"It's been some time, hasn't it," sneered Tao at Goku.

"You're even worse than this Raditz guy!" goku Shouted.

"Am I? I merely seek to bring peace to this city. Your friend Tien Shinhan is endangering the lives of the civilians by trying to evade pursuit in the concrete jungle."

"What?" Before Goku could confirm this, Tao was barraging him. Goku, instead of tanking them, dodged them. Eventually, he blinked behind Tao, but Tao had anticipated this, and Goku's chin came into contact with a fist. It took him a few seconds to get over his shock. Then he roared with pain and repeated the barrage.

None of them noticed the small plane floating overhead, nor the passenger who jumped out of the fuselage carrying a large gun, nor that it stopped falling after about three seconds and came to float in the air... and most importantly, that it was green. At the same time, another green blob appeared on the scene. This one had flown using its own powers. It was the first to make any sort of move, colliding with Tao and Goku at relativistic speeds.

"Ow! Piccolo! That hurt!" shouted Goku, when he recovered.

"Sorry. Kami thought that it would hurt Tao more than it would hurt you," Piccolo responded.

Goku looked around. Eventually, he saw Tao crumpled up in a ball. He was slowly stirring, mumbling about head pains.

"I guess it did."

Meanwhile, Tien and Raditz had found their way to a natural gas power plant. Raditz had stopped chasing Tien and was now channeling energy in the direction of the plant.

"Are you mad? You'll kill yourself!" shouted Tien.

"No, I'll kill everyone else! Even if Tao dies, I think it's acceptable! Then I'll be the strongest person on the planet! Then I'll dominate my remaining Saiyans and we'll rebirth the Saiyan line!" The tragic thing about this was that Raditz was genuinely likely to survive and the others weren't. He was about to launch the massive energy blast when he felt his armor ripping off him and slamming into the ground. It was at this point that he looked behind him.

Kami was wielding the gravity gun that his entourage had retrieved from the Black Mesa facility, and he had just turned Raditz' armor from an immensely strong compound alloy into a small ball of randomly mixed elements.

"What the hell, man! I'm only wearing my underwear under that!" He was. A pair of black hot pants and nothing else. Everyone, including Tao, had surrounded him and would've laughed their asses off had the situation not been so dire.

"I'll kill you for that insult!" he shouted at Kami, unleashing the energy. However, by announcing his intents, he'd given Kami the split second he needed to react and press a small button on his personage, as well as dodge out of the way.

The massive energy beam went spiraling into nowhere, possibly vaporizing some poor bird. Then Raditz saw a red flash.

"What's going -" new locale - "on?" Tao, Goku, Tien, Piccolo, and Kami were still surrounding them, but their visages had become immensely blocky, if recognizable as themselves.

"What the hell did you do?" shouted Raditz.

"Yeah, what's going on, Kami?" Goku asked.

"I miniaturized the device... the one you know about for personal use." Kami stared at Raditz, who merely glowered at him.

"What device? Tell me or I'll..." For a brief moment, gold coins appeared above Raditz's head.

"... Where the hell are we?"

As if to illustrate his question, some text appeared above his head:

"In Anti-Idle, you don't gain experience and gold automatically... unless you turn Idle mode on."

"Aw man, do any of you guys understand English? Because I have no idea what that says," said Goku, shrugging his shoulders. Kami translated, Goku's eyes widened.

"Oh... so this is one of those places that..." (Kami glowered) "... you don't want me to talk about! Cool... I guess," he exclaimed.

"That was not my intention. Rather, you were to overpower Raditz once he had lost his armor-"

"That's not possible! Give me that!" shouted Raditz, snatching the small button from Kami and pressing it. Nothing happened. He jammed it several times, nothing happened.

"Uh oh," Piccolo muttered.

"I'd say it's jammed. Nice job breaking it," sneered Tao.

"I'll break you-" Raditz screamed, before looking over Tao's shoulder.

A strange pixelated creature was gliding towards them - it appeared to be on a surfboard, bringing a large wave with it. At the same time a tinny voice shrieked, "FIGHTING THE BLOODSURFER."

"That's motivation enough for me!" said Goku. A few seconds later, he launched a Kamehameha wave at the creature. It was knocked back slightly, but otherwise unphased.

"This could be bad. Better use my Four Witches technique," muttered Tien Shan, who promptly sprouted an extra pair of arms.

"Yeah, and I'd better use the gravity gun," said Kami.

They only had time to say these things with such leisure because the Bloodsurfer was so sluggish. Of course, this also meant they had time to bring out the artillery and suppressive fire. Even under such massive pressure, the Bloodsurfer's determination and/or stamina held, and it continued to advance.

"Oh no! If that thing gets any closer, it'll kill us!" Kami wailed some minutes later.

"Why don't we move?" asked Goku.

"I'm scared!"

The Bloodsurfer was now close enough to touch Kami - and it would've. However, it suddenly blinked out of existence, being replaced by a small pile of coins.

They fell over in exasperation.

"I don't think we can do that again. We've got to find shelter," said Piccolo. As if some benevolent god was watching over them, they soon found themselves in a comfortable looking house. Unfortunately, for them, there was a tall, slack jawed, emaciated humanoid staring into the distance and swaying as if drunk.

"This is bad, right?" whispered Goku.

"I don't know, stupid," sneered Tao.


	8. Total Destruction

"Alright, nobody move, or speak louder than a hoarse whisper," said Piccolo.

"But I need screams to power my skills," Goku whispered.

"Don't you have a Walkman or something?"

"What's a Walkman?"

"Guys... the big man's gone," said Tien. They stared at the location - he actually was gone.

"He just popped out of existence," Tien continued. Suddenly, a large pile of coins fell on them.

"EXTRA REWARD GAINED FOR NO REASON! 10000 GP!" shrieked the voice that had announced their "fight" with the Bloodsurfer.

"This is a very peculiar dimension. I wonder why we ended up here instead of somewhere else," said Kami.

"I DON'T KNOW!" Goku shouted from halfway across the room. Kami stared at him, then twitched slightly.

"Why are you on the other side of the room?"

"ACHIEVEMENT BONUS GAINED! 57235 GP, 69235 XP!" Everyone but Goku was buried under a mountain of small coins.

Piccolo was the first to scrabble up from the depths of gold.

"If it didn't mean infinite psychological torture for me, I'd beat you to death," he shouted back at Goku.

"... Come to think of it, why haven't we killed Goku?", said Tao, whose cybernetic head was now just barely above the coins. After some degree of twitching, he managed to extract himself.

"It would've been faster had you not felt the urge to grab onto my leg," he spat-spoke - as he drew himself up to a standing position, everyone could see Raditz's hands clinging to his left calf.

He was about to launch a Dodun Ray when he realized that Raditz was pulling him back into the morass.

"Let go, you stupid idiot," he sneered. The lack of a response lead him to slap Raditz's hand. That enraged him.

"Nobody hurts a Saiyan warrior!" he shouted, being surprisingly audible despite being buried under a mountain of coins. Then he burst out, scattering hundreds of coins everywhere.

Before Raditz had any chance to visit more violence on Goku, the "announcer" shrieked again - "ACHIEVEMENT EARNED - RICH MAN! 10 RED COINS EARNED!" Then they heard drunken, off-key singing, before the giant reentered the room - this was about as instantaneous as the time he left.

It seemed, for a few seconds, that it was just going to stand there and gape at nothing for extended periods of time. However, it had appeared staring directly at Goku in his corner, who stared back. He had no idea how to handle the situation properly, so he just waved at the giant. It spontaneously rose into the air, as if this were some cheap cartoon and it was being lifted out of the frame... then it fell back down.

"Goku! Get away from the beast! I'll handle this," shouted Kami, who was now hovering a few inches above the mountain of coins. The giant overheard this and slid towards its money, then "jumped" several times, as if half in surprise and half in ecstasy. A large microphone appeared in its right hand - The group was expecting it to speak, but instead, a few words of broken English appeared for a split second...

"OMG WTF LOLOLOLOLOLOL YAY WTF?" bore into their minds.

"That was unexpected," Tao sneered.

"His grasp of English is worse than mine," said Goku, before collapsing to the floor of the house with laughter. Considering that Goku knew only a few hundred words of the language, this was an insult.

Then out of nowhere, they saw a red flash.

*Where are we going now?* Tien thought to himself.

Instead of being transported into yet another alternate reality, a prepubescent boy appeared in front of him. He had dyed his hair a light shade of purple, and was dressed in similar fashion to Goku, except with a shirt bearing the words "Dragon Ball GT" under his jumpsuit. Everyone stared at him, while the giant slowly tipped over and fell on its side.

"Oh my god! This is so cool! I can't believe I get to see Goku and Kami and Piccolo and ... the rest of you guys," said the boy, showing some confusion at Tao, Raditz, and Tien.

"Who are you? You look somewhat like Vegeta's son, Trunks, but your personality is far different," Tao replied, grumbling because the boy wasn't familiar with him.

"I'm not Trunks... my name is Trucks! Trunks is cool, though."

"Did your parents name you that? Do they even know you're here?"

"No, my real name is Chase Nottingham, but 'Trucks' is so much cooler. Didn't you know that?"

Trucks then waved at Goku.

"Hey, Goku! Do you think you could turn Super Saiyan 4 for me? It'd be really cool!"

Raditz was recoiling at the statement.

"You fool! Nobody's ever become a Super Saiyan since the legendary first one! How could there be four levels of such a transformation?"

"Yeah, I'm still surprised by the fact that I'm a Saiyan instead of a human," shouted Goku.

Trucks had adopted Raditz's current disposition - to say the least, they were shocked and appalled.

"Wait a minute... you guys must be from the early arcs of Dragon Ball Z," he said after much deliberation. He stared at the various characters.

"Where are Vegeta and Nappa? Where's Gohan? Where's that weird turtle guy?"

It was going to take a great deal of explanation to set Trucks's worldview set. 

* * *

Unfortunately, it would be a long time before anyone told him. As the reality warping effects of Tao's ambition spread throughout human media, individual manifestations became more diverse. In a universe where peaceful, pseudo-religious woodland creatures fought stereotypically evil hordes of vermin, morality began to grey. A mouse would occasionally turn on a squirrel, a few stoats successfully sought refuge at a mountain fortress, and a badger went on a rampage amongst shrews. Unfortunately for the "vermin", the woodlanders mostly refused to accept that they were not always saints, and that the vermin were not always of satanic caliber.

This was about to become unusually relevant - the group found themselves suddenly outside, where the sky had turned that peculiar shade of reality warping red.

"This is all your fault, Tao! Your reckless plotting is bringing universes to a fiery end!" shouted Kami.

"No, it's your fault! You're the one who flung us into this alternate dimension!" Tao responded.

It may have been a bad time to fight, but the uneasy peace between Tao/Raditz and the rest of the group had disappeared. Tao punched Kami, Piccolo tackled Tao, Raditz kicked Piccolo, and the festivities began anew. Trucks stood off in a corner, watching them squabble.

"Oh man, this is really awesome entertainment! I wonder if this place has popcorn," he said. He took a cursory stare at the red sky. A faint scream echoed across the sky - in one of the clouds, a small brown dot appeared, then plummeted towards the ground several miles away. Odds are that it died painfully.

The sky then filled up with lightning. Instead of hitting the ground, it arced about, creating rough spheres of electricity. Then, as usual, the red flashes began.

"Wait, why haven't you used the Dragon Balls yet?" asked Trucks, after seeing what was his first red flash. They fell over.

Further lightning, and the ground turned red.

"Yeah, I don't think this universe likes your presence here. Nothing personal," said Tien, who then launched several jabs at Tao and Raditz.  
Due to the group's superior numbers, Tao and Raditz had been surrounded, and were trying to fend off attacks from all sides - punches, kicks, artillery, bursts of red color...

"Wait, the universe is collapsing in on us as we speak!" Kami said. As if the universe had heard him, the buildings winked out of existence, leaving them in a featureless void. Fun.

Then, the ground dropped out on them, and despite their ability to fly, so did their ability to orient themselves and fight properly.

"What the hell, man?" shouted Goku.

"Calm down, guys. This isn't real, you're fine," Trucks said.

"Of course it's real! How did you even get in here?" snarled Piccolo.

Now they were blind.

"Oh, great. Now what's going to happen?" said Raditz.

And then deafening noise. When Goku recovered from his shock, he found himself able to see again. Unfortunately, this only impressed upon on him that he'd been split from the group.

"Man, I hope they can take care of themselves. They might all be separated from each other and I wouldn't know."

They were.

* * *

Somewhere in an entirely different world, a copy of Adobe Flash Player had crashed catastrophically. The affected party, slightly annoyed, reloaded the site he was on. It was an easy fix, and it came with a free lack of data loss.

* * *

The group continued to float incoherently through various portions of the Red Abyss, isolated from each other, from everything but themselves. They had time to think. Naturally, Goku and Raditz didn't bother.

Eventually, Goku bumped into what appeared to be a leafblower.

"Why, hello there! You must be lonely, just floating through these red seas! What's your name?", a voice said.

"Uh... it's Son Goku, and... uh... I speak very bad English, just so you know."

"Okay, I'll try French. Mon nom est Guillaume Fontaine de la Tour De Haute Rive, et je suis en voyage à travers cette dimension pour mon propre plaisir. Pour mes amis, je suis connu comme 'Bill Dauterive'. "

"Sorry, don't speak French. しかし、あなたは私が流暢な日本語を話すし、言っていることを理解していれば," Goku said, hoping the stranger would understand Japanese.

"I don't speak that language... oh well. If I ever see you again, I'll be sure to recognize you," said Bill. Then he pulled the chain on his leafblower and rocketed off.

"Interesting fellow," said Goku in his native language a few minutes later. "Shame he's in such a hurry." Then he bumped into something fleshy.

"What is this? An asteroid belt made of people?", it said.

"No, it's Goku. Where have you been, Tien?" Tien turned around.

"Floating around. Contemplating. I don't know how long we've been here, but it probably doesn't matter anyways."

A red flash hit them. This was getting rather cliched by now, so they had no reason to comment on it. It took them into a suprisingly pleasant forest. It was overcast, and a few drops of rain were making themselves apparent.

"This is the best place yet! We haven't underwent some absurd transformation, and the flora and fauna are recognizably those of Earth!" Goku said, staring at his appendages, then pointing to a nearby owl.

"I hate to be a bother, good sir, but what exactly is this Earth you speak of?" responded the owl. Goku was too shocked to respond, but this invalidated everything he'd postulated. Living on a planet where Dragon Balls had severely modified the available species, he'd grown accustomed to anthromorphic animals - in fact, the ruling dynasty of Earth was composed of dogs.

But owls simply didn't TALK on Earth. It slowly dawned on Goku that he might have no way of coming home. 


	9. Spreading the Disease

Note: The next few chapters diverge in perspective. They are divided into three subsections, concerning each major grouping of characters.

* * *

The next few days were a blur for Goku, as Tien dragged him along through various "interesting" locales. First, they traveled south, and pssed by a great mountain.

"Here may be the greatest source of iron production in a hundred miles. Many fine swords and breastplates came out of this place, but such glorious days are past," a passing traveler said when grilled for information by Tien.

"Hah! Only people at the Rennissance fair use swords! You guys are silly!" said Goku. Tien slapped him, and Goku's naive, inane comments were diminished as they turned southeast, being told that they might be able to solve their plight by traveling to a great city in the locale. That leg of their journey was suprisingly uneventful.

Then, one day, deep in a forest full of tangled undergrowth, Goku tripped on the exposed roots of a particularly gnarly tree.

"I just realized that we've been walking for the last two weeks. Why aren't we flying, Tien?" said Goku.

"Because we have to keep a low profile until we've learned more about these lands," Tien responded - Goku's "idiocy" had delayed the revelation. Naturally, he laughed it off. After another three days, the forest thinned out, and they realized that they'd entered the region's farmland. They passed through orchard after orchard of the most delicious looking fruits they'd ever seen.

"Tien, isn't it strange that there's no livestock? You'd expect to see at least a few cows once we've come this far," Goku asked his partner. This troubled Tien, who informed him that while he found it strange, "... it makes sense that they would segregate the orchards from the staple crops, as their growing conditions are wildly different - What are you doing?"

Goku was ripping strawberries off the bushes at an unfathomable rate, and jamming them into his mouth.

"It's free food! I've got a big appetite!" he declared to the world.

"But people need to sell these crops to live-"

"Regurgitate those berries this instant, or I'll fill you of verminshot," snarled an unseen voice. They quickly turned around - a squirrel wearing a tunic was aiming a musket at the group. He was clearly shaking - the gun's ammunition rattled about in its casing, and a few drops of sweat were dripping off the creatures' auburn fur.

This was an anthromorphic squirrel. All of the squirrels in this world were, but Goku and Tien didn't know this yet. As such, it stood approximately 5 feet tall, could walk on its hind legs, and had an opposable thumb on its claws.

"Why shoot? I was just hungry," said Goku to the squirrel.

"Growing crops is my livelyhood, you incorrigble... what the hell are you, anyways?"

Tien's facial expressions took a turn for the alarmed.

"Honestly, I don't know-"

"Oh, good. You're probably some sort sort of weasel with fox ears, the way my luck is going," the squirrel sneered, as he spat on the ground. "That's today's irrigation."

"Look, we've traveled a long distance, and just want to get to the closest city," said Tien, pointing to a blur that looked like a group of buildings.

"No, you don't."

"What? Why?"

"Because it's been a cesspool ever since they let the vermin in."

"We'll take our chances. Come on, Goku, let's fly." They jumped in the air, terrifying the gun wielding squirrel. In his fear, he screamed and fired a shot in their direction, but it missed wildly. They soon came over the city. Being used to their own planets' clean, towering cities, they found this unusually low to the ground, and horrifyingly polluted. Even as they stared down, struck with horror, plumes of hot black smoke rose up from various buildings.

"It smells terrible!" Goku shouted. He seemed otherwise unharmed by the fumes.

"I imagine it'll only be worse in the thick of it. Let's go," said Tien. They dropped down in the most tolerable looking place they could find, near a wall of red bricks mostly free of pollutants. Most likely, the trees and gardens nearby were sucking up the worst of the materials.

"Witches! Slay them!" said a voice behind them. They turned around and were confronted by a business of ferrets - eight to be exact. Two were female, and eight were carrying muskets similar to that which the squirrel had used.

"Why does everyone want to shoot us?" Goku said.

"Oh, I don't know," sneered the leader of the ferrets. "Maybe it's the fact that you're evil witches who fly around and cause mayhem?"

"Flying isn't evil," Tien offered.

"Indeed it isn't... if you're a bird, which you clearly aren't! You two are witches in hot water."

"Oh, no! The locals aren't pleased with us!" shouted Goku.

"What are you, anyways? You've got less fur than a newborn!"

It was time to think of a cover story, and fast. Luckily, Tien was up to the task.

"We're humans," he said.

"But I'm a-" started Goku.

"A human. You'll have to forgive my partner; he's given to existentialism."

"What manner of beast is a human?" asked one of the female ferrets.

"Well... beasts with less fur and no claws," offered Tien.

"Pretty pathetic, if you ask me."

"What do you care? You're pointing a gun at me; it doesn't really matter how sharp your claws are at this point."

"Good point. Maybe you witches aren't all that bad." They lowered their muskets.

"You know, guns are more accurate if you put spiral grooves on their insides so they come out spinning," said Goku, who, despite his naivete, was proving to have all sorts of odd combat related knowledge.

"How much so?" said a third ferret - this one was short and stocky.

"I don't know the specifics. I just read about it in a book."

"How useful."

"So what's the name of this city?" asked Tien Shinhan.

"Redwall," infodumped the ferret, "which is an oxymoron, considering how filthy and horrible this place is. This building used to be the site of a renowned abbey. Then some people blasted it down with cannons and it was rebuilt as a fortress."

"And a town must've sprung up about it," Tien said.

"Duh. 500,000 beasts live in this area, and it's far too much if you ask me. But the government doesn't let us settle in the country - we have to make battleships and cannons and guns for the army, or it's into the dungeons for a couple years. They're very strict about it," the ferret continued.

"For being in a hellhole, you seem to get a lot of food," said Goku.

"I steal." Cue stares from Goku and Tien Shinhan.

"I have to. My daily salary doesn't provide me enough money to buy the food my family needs!" he insisted.

"Why don't you ask for a raise?"

"Last guy who asked for a raise was fired."

"What if every single worker went in there and asked for a raise at once?"

"..."

"I think you broke his mind," Tien said to Goku.

"..." The ferret shuffled off.

* * *

The seed of an idea had been planted, and Goku's suprising amount of factoids (minus the ability to really make something of them) would've impressed even Kami or Piccolo. Unfortunately for them, they found themselves on Namek after bumping into each other in the redspace, so they were unable to assist Goku and Tien. They didn't even get to meet interesting people - just a girl in her mid teens claiming to be a Shinto shrine maiden, yet not dressing the part.

"What a pleasant suprise it is to be here again for whatever reason. Unfortunately, something feels vaguely off," said Kami.

"We're probably in some warped memory of our recent past," Piccolo said, rather snarkily.

Flight lead them to a village of approximately 50 Namekians. They were green and scaly, and most of them were rather well natured.

"Everything seems about right, although we really shouldn't be here," quipped Kami.

"Why not? It's our home planet. Let's get some more information before we jump to conclusions," Piccolo responded. With this exact purpose, Piccolo touched down, walked towards the oldest Namek he could find (considering how elderly Kami was, this was quite the task), and asked a very simple question.

"What year is it?" He was informed that it was 762. A long series of dialogue and interrogation, complete with all sorts of alien Namek formalities lead to a few useful tidbits of information. They had stumbled on a fellow named Moori - had they read the Dragon Ball manga or watched the anime, they would know what was in store for him.

They heard what sounded like gunfire somewhere off in the distance.

"Why would there be gunfire?" said Kami.

"Maybe Earth launched an invasion of Namek for some reason," said Piccolo.

An energy beam from an unseen locale singed Kami's robe.

"That's no gun! It's a martial arts technique!"

"That would be correct," said a cultured voice. Behind them was an androgynous person with a questionable taste in clothing.

"Help me out here. Are you a boy or a girl?" Piccolo snarked. The stranger winced at this remark.

"I am Zarbon, and I am Frieza's most elegant servant. I am most certainly a man," he said, flourishing his cape.

"Hrm... Zarbon... Zarbon... well that would certainly explain why you're such a fruit," said Kami. He was generally kind, generous, even grandfatherly, so such an acerbic remark was particularly out of character.

Nobody had time to ponder such a thing, as Zarbon immediately screamed, "FUCK YOU, ASSHOLE!" (Not very refined of him) and launched a flurry of blows at Kami and Piccolo, who crumbled under the power of his assault. They found themselves wincing on the ground. Piccolo suspected he had a broken rib.

*There's no way we can take him in an even fight,* Kami thoughtspoke to Piccolo.

*We don't have to...* And Piccolo used what little strength that hadn't been beaten out of him to point at a group of young villagers who were charging Zarbon. They were full of piss and vinegar, and had a good grasp of tactics - Four quickly surrounded Zarbon, keeping him busy with a blitz of melee attacks, while two others stayed in the back and threw energy blasts. They appeared to be doing well for a while, as their target was seemingly motionless for a while.

Then they noticed that he was shrugging off their thousands of blows effortlessly and appeared to be glowing.  
"Oh god, he's about to-"  
Four were thrown into the walls of their huts by an energy nova.

"You should've known I could withstand your feeble blows," he said, before rushing the artillery and handling them in a similar fashion to Kami and Piccolo. They took more time to fall to the ground, but the result was about the same.

*We need to outsmart him, or we all die,* thought Kami. They most likely had plenty of time to attempt such, as Zarbon was caught up in a masturbatory frenzy of self praise.

"I am a graceful warrior! How did you think a few proletarian blasts would unsettle me? Only the most refined of warriors stand a chance against my utter strength!"

It continued on in a similar vein for some time, so Kami and Piccolo had some time to plot and recover. Eventually, Kami stood up and tapped Zarbon on the shoulder from behind.

"What is it? I already defeated you. Do I have to kill you next?" he snapped.

"I have some questions for you. Are you familiar with the Namekian Dragon Balls?" responded Kami.

"I came here to interrogate the locals on such..."

"Why do you seek to obtain them?"

"My lord Frieza needs them to retain hegemony in this sector. Do you know where they are?"

"Yes, I do. But why should you give them to this Frieza fellow, instead of using them for yourself?"

"Why would I need the services of the Dragon Balls?"

And this is where Kami played his trump card.

"Because you could make yourself the most elegant, refined, powerful warrior in the known universe-"

"Am I not already?"

"If you are, why do you serve under Frieza?"

"I... uh..."

"Oh right, you must be weak and ugly-"

A titanic punch in Kami's direction.

"I am NOT weak and ugly. Your entire species will die for such a transgression."

"It will not," said Piccolo, was now standing, and took his place in an ever growing circle of Nameks around the enraged Zarbon.

"By my count, there are about forty of us, and merely one of you. Any attempt to attack will result in your death by swarming. Please surrender," he said.

"But this is impossible!"

"Not at all, ugly boy."

"Oh, so you want ugliness? Let me guess, your sloping forheads and misshapen forms lead you to insult the natural beauty of my species, and the cultivated beauty of-"

Piccolo punched him in the jaw. Besides causing pain and bleeding, the afflicted area began to swell. After standing shocked and dumb for about half a minute, Zarbon then spat out a bloodied tooth.

"You intentionally made me uglier. For this, you must pay." It was easy to see how Zarbon was almost cooking under his own skin. And at this point, he started screaming obscenities at the top of his lungs. Quite a sight, really. The veins on his neck were popping, beads of sweat were dripping down his face, and he was a few steps away from a heart attack.

"Ah, poor Zarbon. The outer rind is taking on the bitter consistency of the inner flesh - Wait, what?" Piccolo had turned out to be more correct than he had bargained for. Zarbon was trasnforming into that which he despised - his bestial warrior form. Immensely ugly, yet immensely powerful

"Hey, he's even uglier than before, hyuk hyuk!" said one of the Nameks whose name was irrelevant.

"But you wanted ugliness. I have taken on my beastial form, and I will now turn this village into an ugly mess," Zarbon sneered. He then grabbed the aforementioned Namek by the leg, spun around a few times to build up momentum, and launched the poor fellow to distances unknown in one fell swoop. Most likely he died, but there's always the chance he landed in a Namekian village and survived. You'll never know.

Then, he decided to go for Kami, who found Zarbon's now scaly hand wrapped around his neck. But before he did anything significant, he made a brief aside to the audience.

"Consider this a lesson. Anyone who dares not to answer my questions truthfully will meet with a similar fate."

Having finished his statement, he threw Kami up into the air. Piccolo gulped in fear. Had any of them played the Budokai Tenkaichi series of fighting games, they would know that this was the "Monster Crush" - Zarbon would soon jump up to Kami's level, knock him downwards, then piledrive him as close to the ground as possible before releasing, most likely killing the victim. It seemed that this was going as planned. Kami was a mere 50 feet from the ground and probably falling at least twice as fast as a Namekian's terminal velocity... Then he heard martial shouting, saw an explosion, found himself picked up by a balding human, heard a cry of outrage from Zarbon, heard another explosion, decided that this was all going too fast to comprehend and passed out.

Meanwhile, Piccolo said, "Oh crap," and then fell unconscious himself.

* * *

As much as the Dragon World would benefit from Tao and Raditz staying in the red space between universes, it did not. Predictably, Raditz's first words upon meeting the fellow were not pleasant.

After some time, the redspace dissipated, leaving them in some manner of universe, where they found themselves floating in midair. Of course they knew how to fly, so they didn't plummet.

"Now where have we ended up? It seems similar to Earth," said Tao, taking in his surroundings.

"Alright then! If Goku is still here, I can kill him and dominate the world!" Raditz exclaimed. What a single minded fellow.

After floating around aimlessly for about a minute, they saw two comets streak down the sky towards a rather large conurbation.

"I have a hunch about when we are," said Tao. "Follow me." He shot off, yet Raditz did not follow. About 100 feet away, he stopped and beckoned for Raditz to come to his position. He did not.

"Why should I anything you say?" he shouted.

"Because Vegeta and Nappa are about to land in that city. Don't you want to see them?"

"... More like prove myself the superior Saiyan, but for once you have a point. Let's roll."

Tao's suspicion was correct. The two "comets" were in fact Vegeta and Nappa's travel capsules, and they were about to cause millions, if not billions of zeni in property damage.

"Oh god, they're going to destroy a block of the city! ... I wanted to destroy that block personally," quipped Raditz.

And so, once the capsules landed, the ensuing shockwave left several dozen people shocked to find their bodies had evaporated into thin air. One of the newfound ghosts found itself laughing maniacally at some poor sap whose lower body hadn't survived the shockwave, before abruptly finding itself in the office of King Yemma. Nobody saw this, of course, because they were too busy feeling terror at the Saiyans who had just disembarked from their capsules.

They had very little to say. Nappa, however, having the louder voice, merely intoned, "WHERE IS KAKAROTT?" Nobody understood him... with the slight exception of Raditz, who flew up to meet him.

"You're still alive," said Vegeta. "Did you succeed in turning him to our will?" Raditz had no (concise) answer for this. Luckily, it was at this point that Tao caught up with him.

"Right on time. I thought you might be interested in the progress of your fellow Saiyan," Tao sneerspoke.

"Who are you?"

"I am Mercenary Tao. We had brief correspondence a year ago, when Raditz landed on this planet-"

"No idea what you're talking about." This was a greater shock to Tao than the Saiyan's bloody arrival was to the city.

*Damn, it must be some bizarre alternate universe! But what kind?* he thought. He was interrupted by what appeared to be a military operation.

"This is a raid! Everybody down on the floor, put your hands up in the air, and we'll be peaceful!" shouted a voice behind Tao, before he found himself being jabbed in the back with a rifle. Needless to say, he spun around, grabbed the rifle, and hit the previous owner (some belligerent human) in the head as if it were a baseball bat.

"Subjects are violent, move move move!" And now they found themselves being swarmed by dozens of well trained soldiers with assault rifles. Of course, since they were Saiyans, this was little more than a minor annoyance. The soldiers had no conception of the power of Saiyans, and the results were predictable and bloody.

"I can't believe I killed 7 troopers with just one punch!" said Raditz to nobody in particular.

"I can't believe it either! What the hell have you been doing on this planet? Were you lifting weights or something?" Nappa responded.

"Look, it's not that simple," interjected Tao. "This is not the same Raditz you know-"

"How the hell is that possible?"

"Alternate reality."

"That's very plausible," Vegeta said, seemingly sincerely. Then he laughed haughtily. "What's next? Are you going to tell us he's the original Super Saiyan?"

"It explains more than you'd expect. The reason you don't remember me communicating with you through your scouter is that it never happened-" For Tao's attempts to explain everything, he got punched in the face. Despite it being mostly metal, it still hurt terribly.

"You're full of shit, don't you know?"

"How rude. If my theories are correct, the one you know as Kakarrot is deader than disco."

"What? Did Raditz kill him?"

"Yes and no." Tao found himself punched again.

"Answer my questions properly, you cybernetic moron."

"I am answering them properly. You see, the Raditz you know did kill Kakarot, but lost his life in the process. The Raditz standing before you is much better than that."

"Why should I believe anything you say?"

"You have your scouter. Use it."

"Alright, fine." Raditz found himself scanned. Tao wondered what had become of Raditz's scanner. Nappa was watching anxiously, and Vegeta soon found his jaw dropping.

"Six thousand. He has a power level of six thousand."

"And this is good? Bad? What?"

"The last time we spoke to Raditz, he was an even match for one of our Saibamen. Now, he could probably slaughter Nappa any day of the week."

"I told you he's been trained," Tao said. His mouth contorted into a grin; combined with his immobile, expressionless upper head this was a rather unsettling effect.

"What are you so happy about? You're only at six hundred yourself."

Now it was time for Raditz to unhinge his jaw and appear suprised.

"I've been losing to a human with a fraction of my power level," he muttered.

"What a shame. You always were soft, weak, clumsy. A disgrace of a Saiyan," Nappa laughspoke.

"I'll kill you for that!"

"Go ahead and try. If you can't beat a mere triple digiteer, then even I, with two thirds of your power level will gib you in minutes!"

With this, Nappa launched himself at Raditz and launched a series of punches and kicks at Raditz, who easily dodged them. He jumped away as quickly as he'd come, and then began charging a massive blast.

*Gotta remember Tao's training - I hate him so much...* Raditz thought. Then the very first lesson he had learned came back to him.

"Hah! Your life ends now, chump!" shouted Nappa. "It's too late for last requests-" He found himself reeling in pain as Raditz launched two quick strikes at his elbows and knees.

"What? Nobody's ever done such a thing before!" Vegeta exclaimed. And they hadn't - if Goku in Tao and Raditz's home universe was mildly nonplussed at having his attacks preempted, this Vegeta had far more trouble accepting the tactics he was seeing.

Raditz used Nappa's brief moment of incapacitation to charge ki into his fists. Six glowing punches to the stomach, and Nappa fell unconscious.

"The pecking order has changed. Would you like to admit defeat now, or after I beat you?" sneered Raditz. Vegeta was quick to pull himself out of shock.

"You only won because your power level is so high," he bluffed.

"You're scared, aren't you?"

"Oh, come on, like I'd be scared to fight anyone." At this point, Vegeta took off his own scouter and passed it to Raditz.

"Scan me," ordered Vegeta. Raditz scanned him.

"Eighteen thousand. What makes you think you can win?"

"What makes the puny six thousander think he can win?"

"You'll see. Why don't you take the first attack?"

Vegeta's response to this was to gather ki in the palms of his hands. Raditz, not wasting any time, punched the area. Vegeta was knocked backwards, but Raditz recoiled too, as the transfer of energy had burnt his hands.

"What the hell was that?" Vegeta shouted.

"The sound of victory."

Unfortunately for Raditz, Vegeta had been able to keep most of the energy he'd charged from dissipating (a series first). Therefore, as Raditz laughed at his own "cleverness", Vegeta simply fired the blast (his trademark Garlic Cannon) at Raditz. It wasn't pretty. It was a glancing blow, as the victim had attempted to get out of the way, but the sheer force of it left gashes all over Raditz's left arm, and the remnants of it destroyed another city block. Cue screams from the area, followed by tank treads crushing debris.

Raditz just stood in shock. Occasionally he would look at his injured arm, then he would look at Vegeta.

"Was I too real for you?" snarked Vegeta after a while of this. Tao facepalmed.

"Just bide your time, Raditz. You can try again later."

"I don't think he'll ever catch up to Vegeta," Nappa mumbled faintly, who was just now stirring and had seen Vegeta's attack.

"I already have!" shouted Raditz, who then rushed at Vegeta and launched his standard barrage of punches and kicks, but Vegeta dodged them all. He was about to channel all his power into one punch...

...and the sky turned red.

"Oh, good, it must be traveling time again," said Tao.

"What the hell are you talking about?" Nappa responded.

Then the ground dropped out from below Tao and Raditz. While Nappa and Vegeta were unafflicted by this seeming "warp plague", even they could see the rage on Raditz's face. If they'd known he was about to disappear from their world, they probably would've taunted him. But it was too late, and they were gone.

"What the hell was that about?" Vegeta asked Nappa - they had seen Tao and Raditz just pop out of existence.

"I don't know."

It took Vegeta a few minutes to realize that he'd given away his scouter. After screaming a few choice expressions of rage, he tackled Nappa, and took the poor Saiyan's scouter. Someone had to make the "IT'S OVER 9000!" jokes. 


	10. Altered History

Kami and Piccolo were awake all of a sudden. Zarbon's bloodied corpse was an eyesore, and they had yet to figure out the cause of the carnage. Then they heard voices.

"Dale! We killed him! What should we do?" said one.

"Hit him a couple more times to make sure he's dead?"

"I keep telling you not to kill any of them!" shouted a third one.

"I'm sorry, Hank! He was going to kill the green people if we didn't! You wanted us to protect the green ones, right?" said the one known as Dale.

*That was nice of them,* Kami thoughtspoke to Piccolo. *Aren't you grateful? Shouldn't you show your thanks?*

"Thanks for the help. I guess," Piccolo muttered, shuffling his feet.

*Good boy.*

Piccolo grimaced.

"Aw, it wasn't anything special. We saw your kind was being irritated and tortured, so we came to help," said another. He would later reveal himself to be Bill Dauterive.

"Right. How did humans get here, anyways?" asked Kami.

"Intentionally," Hank Hill responded. "We've been informed that Lord Frieza intends to attack our planet personally through means unknown, and we are attempt to preempt that through any means possible. Maybe if we can sell him propane and propane accessories, he won't need to attack-"

"I tell you what man, dang'ol nuclear fusion means he won't need any dang'ol propane and he can tell us, 'I'm Lord Frieza and I'm going to morph into my final form immediately just to make you look pathetic before I destroy you, what a bastard," said the fourth, known for his rapid-fire speech patterns.

"Boomhauer, you can't grill with a nuke." Cue laughter from everyone, including the Nameks.

"Why should you fight? Your weapons are crude, and you have the builds of suburbanites, not martial artists," Piccolo sneerspoke.

"...Ever since they tried to turn my son Bobby into a bar of gold, it's been my duty to weed out the maniacs and criminals in Arlen and elsewhere."

"What kind of maniac tries to turn a person into currency?" shouted Kami, completely staggered by the absurdity of such a plot. Hank was merely lost in thought for a while.

"It was my son's allergist."

Abrupt silence, anyways.

"You say you can travel through the universes at a whim. I used to be able to do that, then my machinery broke down," Kami said after a while, presenting the small red button.

"Looks rather underwhelming," muttered Dale.

"It wasn't. But the button jammed."

"Try pressing it a couple times." Kami, having no problem with this, jammed it down. This didn't work. He tried again, didn't work. It was only on the 9th time that he and Piccolo saw the red flash. Then they found themselves in the redspace.

"Why were we never here in the first place?" said Piccolo.

"You don't have to wallow in here if you have a specific destination in mind. We need to find Goku and Tien, but I have no idea where they-"

Suddenly, yet another traveler who happened to be traveling between universes saw Kami and Piccolo wink out of existence.

"What the deuce? Brian, is that supposed to happen?"

Meanwhile, back on Namek, Hank and his friends pondered Kami and Piccolo's former location. They had uprooted several flowers and a shrub, and had they been standing within the group of Nameks, the entire population might've found itself dislocated.

"I was all set to offer them some WD40 and a hammer," said Bill.

"That would be overkill," Hank responded.

* * *

Kami and Piccolo found themselves in a rather awkward position upon returning to a reality - flanking the sides of a badger, staring at Goku, Tien, and what were certainly over a hundred woodland creatures.

"What's going on? What are you guys doing here?" asked Goku, rubbing his eyes and blinking rapidly in disbelief.

"Are these more witches?" a shrew inquired.

"What the hell are you all doing in my office?" roared the badger, banging its paws on its desk.

"We want a raise!" an otter shouted.

"We don't know!" said Piccolo.

"Kami! Piccolo! How did you manage to get here?" Tien exclaimed.

"Intentionally. I guess," responded Kami.

"What matter of beast are you?" the badger interjected. Tien had to do more quick thinking.

"Uh, these are a sort of civilized reptile. I think."

"What if they're not? Our lives would be in grave danger!"

"If they weren't, they wouldn't be wearing clothing. Think about it."

The badger stared at the Nameks, poring over their every feature. After some time, they got uncomfortable with his staring, and scurried to the other side of the desk, joining Goku and Tien.

"I think you should give your workers a raise," Goku said after an uncomfortable silence. A wave of catcalls and jeers from the creatures reinforced him momentarily.

"Silence!" exclaimed the badger, banging on his desk in an attempt to draw attention to himself.

"I cannot give all of you raises, because there simply isn't enough MONEY. Unless you work much harder, and turn out far more products, increasing your paychecks will cause the factory to go out of business. Then what will you do? Starve? Steal?" These were intimidating words, and as he spoke, everyone else came to a silence. There was much shuffling of feet and oaths sworn under breaths.

Finally, a rat spoke up. "Prove it." The crowd sympathized with this for obvious reasons. Within seconds, they were chanting the rat's words.

"I... uh... let me just..." Too late. A mammalian crush was forming as everyone sought to ransack the badger's belongings. Goku, Tien, Kami, and Piccolo were quick to get above the action, then reach the back of the crowd before they could be trampled or otherwise injured. Then, they ran out of the building into a seemingly placid (if horrible smelling) courtyard.

"What the hell is going on there?" said Kami.

Tien had a lot of explaining to do.

* * *

After their scintillating conversation with the ferrets, Goku and Tien sought lodgings. As they had no valid currency (they were laughed at when they tried to use their zeni, and their strict moral codes prevented them from stealing), it took some haggling to produce a deal at a villa on the outskirts of the city.

"You two can stay for free on one condition," said the shrew who owned the place.

"What's that condition?" Goku asked.

"Let's see... you keep the place clean, you cook meals, you cook for 50 or so once a month, because the first of the month is a Guosim meeting and we discuss policy. Oh, and you also have to do gardening. If you can't handle that, I'll boot you out."

*Willing to do a little grunt work? It's only till we can earn some money of some sort,* Tien transmitted to Goku.

*We're excellent warriors. I'm sure there's some crossover between fighting and working,* Goku responded.

"I accept your offer," said Tien to the shrew.

"Good. There's a fish in the kitchen. Make a meal out of some of it, and salt the rest." With that, the shrew walked towards the stairs. Two steps in, he did a double take.

"Hey! You with three eyes! Why do you not have two eyes?" the shrew shrieked, pointing towards Tien's third eye.

"Calm down! I gained it as a result of achieving enlightenment," responded Tien.

"Yeah, whatever. Get to work." The shrew cleared the stairs. Goku and Tien weren't particularly interested in living off the land (especially with all the ecorape that the city was putting out), so they quickly got to work.

"I wish I knew more about cooking," muttered Tien. "All I ever learned in that regard was from the Crane Hermit."

"You think you're bad off? I can cook meat on fire, and that's about it," Goku responded, offhandedly descaling the fish with great precision.

There was very little to talk about, and after a while, the fish found itself cleaned, gutted, cooked, spiced, and the remaining fillet would not have much time to make scintillating conversation with the side salad and cherry wine.

At dinner, the shrew grudgingly bit into the fish, chewed it, swallowed it. No obvious signs of displeasure or poisoning.

"So you do know how to cook. That's fortunate."

* * *

After proving themselves competent cooks, cleaning a bedroom, drawing a bath, and a variety of other tasks, Goku and Tien finally had a chance to sleep.

"Do you think this is a good world or a bad world?" Goku asked, while laying in the beds the shrew had provided for his use.

"Definitely a bad world. The city is an eyesore, and it's not exactly pleasant for the rest of the senses," responded Tien. "Also, I'm getting the feeling there's some racism afoot."

"Racism is bad."

"I noticed. I'll look into it tommorow."

Much to their minor benefit, their shrew employer told them to obtain a large amount of groceries - clearly those would be earmarked for the use of the Guosim.

"We'll need lots of green vegetables, lots of dairy products, some hotroot to make soup with, and so on. Here's some money. That should more than cover it... unless the grocers are on strike again, in which case I'll have to give you directions to another town."

Word had not yet spread that Goku and Tien could fly, so they waited until they were out of eyesight to take off. They touched down in what appeared to be a relatively unoccupied alley. They were about to enter a courtyard when they suddenly found themselves surrounded.

"Hands up or- Oh. It's you again." This was the small patrol of musket wielding ferrets that had denounced Goku and Tien as witches.

"Yeah, we're getting groceries for some Guosim shrew in a villa a few miles outside the city," Goku informed them. At this point, a few ferrets started foaming at the mouth.

"That one? He's a collossal assfur to anyone who doesn't make it onto his unwritten list of good animals. A list of which ferrets will never partake, and I don't know how you managed to gain his trust," the leader responded, prior to spitting on the cobblestones.

"Well, we did cook a meal for him, and it turned out not to be poisonous."

"Very out of character for him. Any other landowner on the border would've turned you down instantly and possibly attacked you."

Various small talk ensued for a while.

"How's the walk-in proceeding?" Tien inquired after some time.

"I've only told a few people, but they promised to pass on the idea. If we're lucky, we'll get a few dozen people asking the boss." It wasn't the ferret's fault that he'd underestimated the popularity of such an idea, because it hadn't happened yet.

"We'd best get going," said Goku. They jumped over the ferrets and into the courtyard, with intent to purchase.

"How the hell do they do that?" one of the more skeptical ferrets screamed.

* * *

"So now you know the rest of the story," Goku told Kami and Piccolo in the present.

"How many days were there between this event and the walk-in?" asked Piccolo.

"Only three."

"I think time is passing differently in these dimensions. But I wouldn't know." After a while, a thought struck him. "How long have we been 'away' (and here he made finger quotes) in the Dragon World?"

It was worth pondering. But suddenly, they heard a tinkle, and felt a short glass shower rain on them. They scattered; a few seconds later, it was followed by the meaty thud of the badger.

"We should help him, but what if he's actually the stingy old miser everyone thinks he is?" Tien said.

"I'll talk to them," Kami responded, just in the nick of time. It was barely a second later before the first woodlanders barged out of the factory, screaming obscenities and slogans. Considering that strikes were fairly rare in this city, these were rather bulky slogans that didn't really roll off the tongue that well, like "END THE FOURTEEN HOUR WORKDAY" and "GIVE US MORE MONEY SO WE CAN FEED OUR FAMILIES". Still, they seemed to inspire the beasts.

"Um... hello again," said Goku to the crowd.

"The badger must die!" a rat hollered at him.

"Surely killing him isn't the only option?"

"The badger must die!"

"Look, can't you think rationally about this? If you were in his situation you'd probably be killed in an instant," Kami reasoned.

"If I was like the badger, then I'd commit suicide before I did anything evil!" shouted a mole. Suprisingly, his diction was clear, and the stereotypical "mole" accent was rather thin.

"Gurr, oi think ya shoud get aut of moi way so oi can disembowel the gurt cruel badger moiself!" It didn't apply to ALL the moles.

"Haven't you considered that if you can woo him to your side, you can possibly take advantage of his wealth and power?" reasoned Tien. This made for good contemplation amongst the woodlanders. The noise began again, but this time, screeches and bickering took the place of sloganeering, and then a few meaty sounds - punches and kicks contacting fur covered flesh.

"How is killing each other going to help you gain what you deserve?" Tien shouted over the cacophony.

"The badger cannot be convinced! The bourgeoise must die!" "The furless ones speak truth! A powerful ally can get us our just dues!"  
"Clearly the furless ones are also traitors and must be killed!"

Before any sort of consensus (or at least truce) could be reached, the sound of marching paws and a fife playing a martial tune infringed upon everyone's senses. This was some sort of police squadron. They soon cleared the corner of the streets. For Goku, Tien, Kami, and Piccolo, the sight of 25 woodlanders (8 mice, 11 squirrels, 3 otters, 2 shrews, and a vole) wearing immaculate red overcoats and pressed trousers while carrying relatively modern (i.e spiral-barreled) rifles with attached bayonets, and marching in perfect formation was a surreal sight.

There was no clear leader, but the vole took out a crude megaphone and shouted, "Break it up, or all of you shall be under arrest!" The woodlanders stared at them - while their weapons were scarcer and cruder, they outnumbered the police at least 4 to 1. There were two clear options, and the woodlanders, after mulling around aimlessly for a few seconds, drew the few muskets they had and fired on the police. Three shots landed, shattered bones, drawing blood. The vole had time to issue a retreat order before the noise became too loud. Again, Kami's entourage had to escape the human crush by flying - causing even more panic in the police, while the woodlanders were too busy attacking to care.

50 feet up in the air, Goku spoke to his allies.

"Should we save the badger?" he asked.

"Why not? Bring him to this shrew you're working for." They descended. Before any of them could lift the fellow, Kami silently indicated he wanted to inspect the body. A fairly quick process - the badger had landed on his left leg, and broken it rather badly. The rest of his wounds (glass cuts and a bruised back) would be relatively easy to handle.

"I'd better make a splint for his leg," said Kami. One appeared out of thin air around the broken leg.

"Why not make a cast instead?" Piccolo asked him.

"I'm not a veterinarian. Besides, it might interact poorly with fur. I don't know." They patched up the badger with conjured medical supplies, and eventually took off, balancing the poor fellow on a stretcher.

The sight of the four flying people now carrying a badger on a stretcher demoralized the police even further. They were putting up about as good a fight as they could, considering how painfully outnumbered they were. It got worse - further woodlanders, hearing the slogans pierce through them and uncover their inner discontent were joining the mob. When they had stormed the badger's office, they numbered about 100. Now, they were 250, now they were 500, now they were one thousand and still growing. A mass riot was not something to be entangled in.

Therefore, they merely flew the badger back to Goku and Tien's employer. Needless to say, the shrew was nonplussed and frustrated by the presence of the injured badger and the two Nameks.

"I can explain-" said Tien, before being interrupted.

"Why are you and two... things carrying Orlando Swordstripe with you? What's wrong with his leg? What have you done to him?" the shrew sputtered.

"I can... explain." Orlando was awake, and the splint was alleviating the worst of the pain in his leg. He recounted the events to the shrew.

"You did the right thing by sparing him," said the shrew after some time. "Soon, his influence will bring all of this unpleasantness to a stop." Tien glared at the two.

"Clearly, we do not agree on some very crucial matters," he informed them.

* * *

Elsewhere, Yamcha, Chiaotzu, and Yajirobe were blissfully unaffected by the warp plague. They spent their days learning martial arts, teaching martial arts, preparing for further conflicts. Yamcha and Chaiotzu were already frequent Budokai participants, so throngs of interested pupils were learning how to scream "KAMEMHAMEHA", lift enormous amounts of weight, and other spiritual things.

Yajirobe, however, had other plans.

"Look, I hate teaching. It stresses me out, and I don't like being stressed out," he explained to the others one day.

"But you're the only swordfighter of any competence we know!" pleaded Yamcha.

"I don't like fighting either."

"Well, we can't force you to do this if you don't like it. But if you do leave, try to find a suitable replacement, okay?"

"Yeah, fine, whatever."

Yajirobe, in fact, was thinking about learning how to cook, becoming a chef at a fancy restaurant. In the mean time, he sought someone who specialized in armed combat - mostly with swords. Unfortunately for him, nobody even came close - he reluctantly fought all challengers and defeated them handily - a result of the enhanced training methods the dojo had developed. He was nearly on the point of reluctantly returning to the job proper, when, in a brief flash of red one day, a stranger appeared in front of him.

"I thought my hand was severed-" he began. It wasn't. "Clearly something is very strange about this-" He stared at Yajirobe, who was clearly nonplussed enough to return his stare.

"The Force is strong in you, yet your mind is clearly weary. What are you, and what is this place?", he finally queried.

"Heh. This is a dojo, and I'm Yajirobe. Do you want to teach people how to fight with swords?" He'd asked everyone who challenged him this, some had accepted, none had succeeded.

"Clearly, your priorities are absurd. First, I must determine how I reached this place, and why my body has been restored to a pristine state."

Yajirobe, being rather unwilling to teach, resorted to methods of scapegoat.

"Look, I'll level with you. Some guy named Mercenary Tao has been disrupting reality in ways unknown, and most likely you were displaced as a result of it. Do you know anything about swordfighting and or teaching?"

"... Clearly this Tao fellow should be brought to justice. The other problem is far more enigmatic."

"Yeah. We've lost some of our military to it, and I hate teaching new blood."

"Why should I, a complete stranger, replace you?"

"Yes, you correctly inferred that I can fight proficiently, and yes, I can pass on my knowledge. But why should I teach, as opposed to going out in the front line?"

"If you were to train recruits, they would fight better, and casualties would be lower. You could still join major battles as necessary."

"Surely this Tao is not a greater threat than Palpatine?"

"Palpawhat?"

"Who rules this nation of yours?"

"A talking dog. Don't act so surprised."

The stranger's worldview literally changed before Yajirobe. A shrewd viewer could pinpoint the exact point at which his complete and utter shock turned to a grudging acceptance.

"Okay, fine. You've convinced me to take over your job. But if I find a way back to Coruscant, you'll probably have to return to this job." With this, the stranger bowed, and walked to the desk Yajirobe indicated for him.

"I'm Mace Windu. With any luck, we can restore peace and harmony to this land," he said after some time. After some exchange of pleasantries, Yajirobe went to inform his friends that he'd found what appeared to be a suitable replacement. Unfortunately, without an adequate simulacrum of a lightsaber, Windu's preferred combat style of "Vapaad" (a dangerous, but effect form of lightsaber combat drawing strength from inner turmoil) would be of limited utility. Perhaps it would be better to develop a new sort of combat form for this planet?

* * *

Everyone of significance was producing all sorts of ideas on combat. Some of them were even effective.

For instance, after seeing how enraged the woodland creatures of Redwall were with the poor living conditions, Goku had taken his group (now including Orlando Swordstripe, free with complimentary crutch and cast) to the parliamentary building in an attempt to gain some law reform.

Orlando did most of the speaking - despite the good will Kami's entourage was showing him, he was still uneasy about siding with the rioters.

"You'll only get in peacefully with me securing your passage. Understand that?" he'd informed them some time earlier.

Now, they were in the head of state's office. It was grandiose and indulgent, to say the least. Redwall was the capital of a small but relatively powerful country (think 19th century Great Britain), and the mouse ruling it had riches that made even the average human look like a pauper.

"So, what does the beloved arms manufacturer want from me, the most powerful person in this country?", said the head (who was a prime minister).

"I want the government to audit itself. Take a look at the budget, the bureaucracy, the personnel, see what is necessary and legal." On paper, it sounded like a decent compromise - improve the lot of the worker without causing massive anarchy.

"Sure, we'll audit ourselves. Right after we take orders from someone who chooses to mingle with vermin and these aliens flanking you," the minister sneered.

"Oh right, I forgot. Mass racism. Clearly that benefits you," Tien sneered back at him.

"It's not racism, when it's entirely justified." At this point, the minister stood up, and walked slowly around the group.

"You see, good woodlanders like I can trace our ancestry back to noble heroes like John Churchmouse, Lord Brocktree, Songbreeze Swifteye, and so on. However, these vermin are descended from such evils as Cluny the Scourge, Feragho the Assassin, Badrang the Tyrant... all very horrible names and all complete and utter evil. These things travel with you through your blood, you know."

"What about Piccolo?" Kami said, pointing to his Namekian counterpart. "He was once an omnicidal maniac, but he's reformed himself into a functioning member of our society." Piccolo nodded at this.

"Yeah, like you reptiles could actually build a functioning society. What are the odds of that?" Clearly the mouse's sentiments were socially acceptable.

"Namek functions far better than this mess of a city does," snarled Kami. He was slowly losing the composure that suited a Guardian, and Piccolo was beginning to feel some degree of anger leak into his mind.

"Don't insult my proud city."

"Clearly, it's nothing to be proud of."

"Guards, seize these fellows and imprison them," the mouse shouted. A dozen rifle-wielding mice (who could pass for police) marched into the hall - they jabbed the ends of their guns into the backs of the group.

*This has clearly gone too far,* Kami thoughtspoke to the group, before jumping up to the high ceiling of the room, and floating there. The guards, instead of standing slack jawed and clueless at the flying Namek, quickly remembered their training and unloaded a volley at him, but it was effortlessly dodged, as was par for the weapon. Instead of reloading, the guards then charged the remaining three, holstering their guns and pulling out batons. Needless to say, Goku resorted to his typical method of lightning fast strikes intended to disable the warriors, and managed to fell 9 of the 12 within seconds.

Then, they saw the remaining three flash red. In a move uncharacteristic of them, they jumped up to Kami's level, kicked him in the shins, and landed flawlessly. It hurt tremendously.

"What the hell is going on?" roared the minister. Then, he ducked as Goku found himself thrown inches away from the window, decelerating moments before shattering it.

"Hey, these guys are a lot stronger than expected!" shouted Goku, who then tackled one. The mouse slammed into the door, but was seemingly unfazed by this. He flew at Goku, who returned the favor, and they entered a strange sort of grapple where they held hands, locked legs, and twitched convulsively.

"Goku! Don't just grapple him! Use tactics of some-" said Tien, before the second mouse punched him in the mouth. Tien simply bashed him over the head, but then got kneed in the groin. Still, his message got across, and Goku blinked behind the mouse, only to be himself punched in the jaw.

The third mouse was having problems, as Piccolo was forcing him into a corner with feint punches - none would hit a competent opponent, but most opponents would be maneuvered into awkward situations. Kami was also beginning to recover from the pain in his shins - he awkwardly floated towards the third mouse, and began conjuring spiked boards behind the poor fellow. It was a brilliant plan and once the fighting mouse picked up on it, he screamed in terror. His companions drew themselves off Goku and Tien to assault Piccolo.

"I swear by Martin the Warrior... does your entire group fight like a barrage of hellspawned witches?" Orlando Swordstripe had limped outside the fight easily, because nobody was paying him attention. He took the time to look back once he'd reached the doors of the minister's office, and beheld an awkward sight.

To summarize:  
1. The three empowered guard mice were barraging Piccolo with their claws and paws.  
2. Piccolo would've crumpled had two of them not been kidney punched by Goku and Tien.  
3. Kami was summoning all sorts of barricades in an attempt to protect Piccolo, but the mice were punching through them effortlessly.  
4. Did I mention that this chaos was unfolding near the ceiling of the room, and that a steady rain of metal, fur, and blood was falling?

This distracted everyone for long enough that Orlando was able to pick up one of the spikes and throw it at the first guard mouse. Said mouse was so unable to accept that it might hurt him that he let it tear through his head, destroying his brain and killing him instantly. The other two mice fled through the window (of course, breaking it and embedding a few shards in their fur), but before they could get far, the red flashes displaced them with the original, rifle-wielding mice, who fell some distance.

"Yes, I also think it's weird," Tien muttered. Mass stares from Orlando. "I was assuming you weren't expecting any of this. It makes sense that you wouldn't."

"Right. Where's the minister?" A quick search - said mouse was hiding behind a tapestry.

"Please! Witches, have mercy! Don't cast me into the Hellgates!" screamed the minister, once he was revealed.

"I keep telling everyone that we're not witches, but nobody believes me," Goku responded. He shrugged.

"What else but a witch could fight with such demonic prowness? Besides legendary Martin the Warrior."

"Look, we don't want to hurt you. We only fought with the rodents because they tried to attack us. Maybe you shouldn't be so trigger happy," Kami lectured. He thought for a second.

"You and Orlando should talk; there are a great many injustices in this city that you should-"

Red flash.

"-solve?" The group, including Orlando and the minister were now in a featureless white space. The minister fainted.

"What the hell just happened?" Orlando bellowed.

"Random dimensional shift. That's been happening an awful lot lately, and we're trying our best to stop it," Piccolo responded.

They heard strange words from a distance.

"All of my catchphrases are licensed for derivative use through Creative Commons!" warbled the owner of said words.

"Look, we can get back. I just need to use my equipment while showing the proper determination," Kami said, not without the slightest hint of unease in his voice. Then, a strange creature walked up to him.

"Well, hey there, folks! I'm Slightly Eclectic Anthropomorphic Dog! Welcome to our dimension!" warbled the creature.

"You look familiar," said Goku. "Haven't I seen you in a cartoon somewhere before?"

"Alas, not I. Perhaps you're referring to Goofy, or his son Maxwell?"

"Right."

"Look, as much as we'd love to stay and chat, we need to drop off the badger and the mouse in their home dimension. Maybe someday we can visit again?" Kami informed the creature.

"Okay. Maybe next time you can meet my friends Perky Rodent, Anatidae the Pantsless Sailor, and Aeronautical Baby Elephant?"

"Yeah, let's just hope we don't get sued." With that, Kami pressed the button on his persona. It wasn't jammed, it worked fine, and they were soon back in the Redwallverse.

"I'm afraid I've become more tangled in these affairs than I'd like. There are threats in our home dimension as well," said Kami to Orlando after a moment.

"You think you might come back here as well, once these are tied up?" Orlando responded.

"I'd hope so, you seem like a reasonable fellow. Goodbye." With that, Kami pressed the button again. Back to the Dragon World. Good, familiar soil.

"That was rather more drawn out than I'd hoped. On the other hand, Tao and Raditz should be out of our faces for a little while, and they can't possibly do any more damage to the universes than they already have... right?" Piccolo said.

"As far as I know, yes."

* * *

Mercenary Tao and Raditz were in no condition to talk. They found themselves under FIFTEEN kilometers of water, and were only staying alive by sheer, absurd, shonen feats of strength.

"Oh, come on. Can't we go into that metal thing?" shouted Raditz. In this case, it was a series of hemispheres built into the ground and connected by small tubes.

"I want to just as much as you do. Trying to enter would get us killed. We're going up." Raditz scowled at Tao for this, but grudgingly followed him. It was slow going - had they exploded out of the water (like they could, according to Tao), the decompression would kill them instantly (this too was Tao's claim).

First stop: The approximate halfway point. While waiting to decompress, they emitted a large portion of light to take in their surroundings, traumatizing the vestigial eyes of some of the sea creatures.

"Holy ass, that's a big mountain," Raditz muttered, pointing at an absolutely colossal rock outcropping. No comment from Tao.

They kept swimming up, stopping to decompress at increasingly short intervals. Eventually, they surfaced. It was a dire sight - mounds of plastic floated across an endless ocean.

"What the hell happened here?" exclaimed Tao. He shot out of the water, and flew into the air. Raditz followed. The higher he went, the more there was nothing but oceans. Eventually, the air became too thin for him to breathe (about 10 KM), and clearly something was wrong with the planet.

"Where's the goddamned land?" they both shouted.

"I think I'll make some!" sneered Raditz. The idea had come to him unusually quickly for a Saiyan; probably because it was a chance to visit some destruction upon the planet. He began silently charging up an energy beam.

"Going to breach the mantle of the planet or something?" Tao asked him.

"I'm going to pierce this planet clean." Raditz was glowing red from the accrued energy.

"Well, make sure not to destroy the planet entirely until we have a spaceship."

Raditz's aura was turning white from the sheer heat. Finally, he fired straight down - it was absolutely enormous, and Tao was nearly scalded by it from 50 feet away. The beam was only fired for a few seconds, though. When it dissipated, they saw a pool of gleaming magma at the bottom. As it was no longer under immense pressure, it shot out faster and in larger quantities than the water around it could fall in.

Tao and Raditz witnessed further chaos as a result of this - the impact of the energy beam was probably greater than the impact that destroyed the dinosaurs 65 million years ago. It was also far more concentrated into one area, so the rebound began stripping rocks in a huge radius away from their site and throwing them into the air - combined with the colossal amount of water, it probably cost the planet some significant percentage of its mass. It also created an audiovisual spectacle that people would've paid hundreds of dollars to see - as civilization had collapsed from the rising oceans, only about ten thousand got to see the pillar of superheated magma and steam that seemingly reached to the heavens - a few thousand more were closer to the impact, but were killed as the heat of this event boiled the water from under them, or melted them directly.

Maybe a trained geologist could predict what happened as a result of this catastrophe. The few remaining humans hoped that the oceans would lower, and that they wouldn't die in the process. Raditz's need for pyrotechnics and senseless destruction was satisfied, and Tao wasn't dead.

But it didn't matter, because they found themselves flashing into red and thrust back into the space between the dimensions.

"I assume these are all coiled so thin we can't see them," Tao quipped, some time after appearing in the area.

"Don't say nonsensical things," muttered Raditz. Further wandering ensued. Fortunately for them, it was only a relatively short time before a world coalesced in front of them, and they were dumped into it. They landed prone, and Tao was the first to look up.

"Well, Raditz, here's your terra firma... and we appear to have landed in front of some..." and Tao finished tilting his head, "... it's just Goku. Consider your buttocks proverbially kicked." He and Raditz jumped to their feet.

"Tao! Raditz! Good to see you after all these months! Are you going to repent the evil of your ways?" Goku said, seemingly gregarious and friendly.

*His strength seems to have increased significantly,* thought Tao to himself. *It's almost, but not quite masking the gains of his friends... who are awfully close by...*

"Maybe you can send over a fruit basket or something. Raditz and I have to sort out some internal affairs," responded Tao after a while. He sounded friendly, but even Raditz could tell that it was fake. He jumped into the air and tore off.

"What the hell is wrong with him?" Raditz shouted, as he followed.


	11. Even the Canon Is Attacking Us

AUTHOR'S NOTE: "First Contact Is Bad For You" is a book that I've been working on for about two years, and very soon, it should be available on most major eBook retailers - i.e you should be able to read it on a Kindle, an iPad, or basically any device or software that supports ePub files. It's a little saner than this, by virtue of not having to star every popular fictional character I feel like putting in. Not recommended for children due to the great deal of references to technology and culture.

Extradimensional travel (of the intentional sort) was on hold for the next few months. Kami and Mr. Popo used their free time to work on the inherent problems. A few weeks in, they decided there was a solution.

"I have invented a new spell of a sort. It should reflect any sort of dimensional travelers back to their previous locations. Nobody gets out, nobody gets in. However, I need someone quite powerful to channel it on a regular basis- they have to be significantly more powerful than I am," Mr. Popo informed Kami.

"Yes, I know that. I've been helping you," snarked Kami.

"I believe that is the result of the dimensional information travel. I have no way of knowing that the enchantment will prevent this from happening, so act accordingly."

"Right. It can't be Goku, Tien, or any other frontline fighter, for obvious reasons. How about the local King Kai?"

"Too busy."

"Then I don't know. It doesn't have to only be one person, right?"

Mr. Popo stared at him for a few moments.

"I hadn't thought of that. I'll have to redesign some components of the spell with this in mind. But we'll look for people. Groups of deranged cultists may do nicely."

More deliberation continued on various factors. Most importantly:

"What will we do with outsiders from other universes?" Kami asked Mr. Popo.

"Tell them to cope. Hopefully they won't go ballistic."

* * *

The frontline fighters trained themselves, while their approximate sidekicks (Krillin, Yamcha, Chiaotzu, etc.) also trained the commoners. It was a tenable system, to a point. If someone managed to beat, for example, Yamcha with the Turtle Hermit techniques they learned, it would increase the complexity of the social networks, and that would be nothing but a problem. So of course the teachers trained too, if only to stay one step ahead of their pupils.

Some of the pupils learned incredibly fast, though; they had names that they wanted to make famous. Case in point:

One day, Tien was demonstrating the use of his "Four Witches" technique by inflicting twice as much pressure on a local punching bag as he could without the extra arms. The recruits' spirits were clearly in the right place, but their success rate in imitating him left much to be desired. Most of them managed to grow extra limbs, but not of the right sort or quantity.

"Sir, I appear to have sprouted a pair of phalluses from my armpits," said one of the more unfortunate ones one day.

"Keep in mind that this won't increase your chances of scoring." Tien whistled, and Chiaotzu floated in.

"Alright, what horrible mutation has this one given- BAHAHAHAHA!" Apparently Chiaotzu found this funny to the point of rolling on the floor. After a few seconds, he managed to stand up and cast a spell of healing. The extra penises were absorbed back into the victim's body.

"Good thing I've been paying attention to Kami, otherwise you'd be even worse off," sneered Chiaotzu, pointing to the man's crotch. Mercifully (?), it was as full as ever.

A few minutes later, someone managed to get it right.

"Clearly, I have mastered your most powerful technique and now am ready to challenge you for control of the dojo," said the woman to Tien, flexing all four of her current arms menacingly.

"Not again," Tien groaned. "Let's get this over with." He briefly thought back to the last three times she'd challenged him. Each time, she'd shown significant fighting ability, but it hadn't mattered, as Tien had exploited some critical weakness in her fighting style of the week.

Everyone cleared a space for Tien and the challenger to work. An impartial referee was found (Mace Windu), and the battle began. This was typical fare for the Dragon World - the challenger tried to fit in as many attacks as she could, and Tien simply tried to dodge them for the time being. Fortunately, he wasn't merely dodging the attacks - he was also analyzing them.

*Maybe I should've made her dispel the arms beforehand... Nah.* It occurred to Tien that his opponent wasn't paying much attention to her legs, so he dropped down, and aimed a low kick at the left one. Had she paid more attention to the area, she wouldn't have been knocked over. Still, it was a trivial blow and she stood up moments later. Again with the attacks. This really was nothing new.

"Wait," commanded Tien after a moment.

"For what?" the challenger asked, while continuing to pummel Tien.

"I have an idea that should turn this in your favor."

"Continue as usual and lose to me? I was already winning."

"I'll let you have the dojo if you can charge up an attack quickly enough to fell me."

"That's a strange request."

"Why are you two breaking from your accepted procedure?" Mace Windu said, striding into the ring.

"We need to have a word in private," Tien told Windu, gesturing for him to walk into a corner. When they did, he whispered in Windu's right ear.

"I want to impress on her the flaws in her coordination, otherwise she could get herself killed in seconds. Also, I'm feeling a bit peckish, and want to go out for lunch."

"Right. I'll allow it; I have occasionally used such a method of teaching myself."

Having reached an agreement, Tien and Windu went back to their designated positions.

"So I'll give you 40 minutes to charge the strongest energy blast you can. If it knocks me unconscious for more than 10 seconds, I'll consider you the winner. Otherwise, the fight will continue until such, or one of us admits defeat," Tien informed the girl of the specifics.

"...You have thought this through, right? I mean, giving away a dojo requires a lot of paperwork with the city government or something... I assume."

"Don't be so confident. The 40 minutes start now." And so Tien walked out of the ring.

"Where are you going?"

"You're losing valuable charging time." The woman grimaced at Tien, but grudgingly began channeling ki.

In the lobby, Tien intercepted Goku and Krillin, who were heading to lunch.

"We're heading to the Gigantic Rice Bowl. Want to join us?" said Goku.

"It won't take more than 30 minutes or so, right?" Tien asked him.

"Not at all."

"Then I'll join you," he said. They made their way to the buffet, and quickly engorged themselves on massive amounts of food (Goku more so than the others, for obvious reasons).

"Lucky this place serves more than rice," said Tien, who was working through a barbecued pork sandwich.

"I'm sure," Krillin muttered. He was too busy stuffing his face to talk. Goku, on the other hand, had consumed his portion with record velocity and had time to waste.

"You know, I've been thinking about those woodlanders in that Redwall place. What brings anyone to build a city that crappy?" he said, out of the blue.

"I'm pretty sure they weren't intending it to be a cesspool," Tien responded.

"But look at our world! All the cities are prosperous, clean, and government brutality is kept to a low minimum. What have we got that they don't?"

"... it's called technology. A long time ago, all of our world's cities were like that - crowded, smelly, full of crime and other social problems destined to shorten one's life expectancy. This was mostly during the first industrial revolution, but still."

"Gee, I never knew that. And I study a lot of history, you know?"

"Yeah. Military history. Remember that time you were reading about the Thirty Years War? You were like, 'Tien! Krillin! Tercios are really cool! Armies of today should be like that!' Not to mention you skipped over the bits of political exposition just to get to the battles."

"Whatever you say, man. Besides, tercios were obsolete by the middle of the 17th century."

"..." Tien had nothing to say to this, and merely finished his meal.

"I'd better get back to the dojo," he uttered after a while. "Good thing you guys paid for the food in advance."

It was a fairly short trip back to the dojo. He had 15 minutes to spare, so when he walked into the room where the "battle" was proceeding, he was shocked by the size and brightness of the energy ball his student had prepared for him. Apparently its boundaries had come too close to the other people in the room, and they were all slowly backing out of the room. Even Mace Windu had left; probably because he felt any actual competition had ended.

"15 minutes, Tien. Then you are no longer the master, and you will learn from me."

"I see." With this, Tien blinked behind the girl and hit her in the back. It broke her concentration, and the energy dissipated in bright teal lightning over the course of a few seconds. The cacophony of it failed to overwhelm her scream of rage and frustration.

"Two things," and here Tien began lecturing her, "Firstly, I never said that I wouldn't try to stop you from building up said resevoir of energy. Secondly, any competent enemy would flee or preempt you long before you could ever finish channeling such an attack."

Only labored breathing from the pupil.

"Think about it, and try again some day." With that, Tien entered the side room where everyone else was cowering.

"Did you see the fucking size of that thing?" said one person. "She could've killed us all!" another added.  
"Why'd you let her do it, Tien?"  
"I have my reasons," responded Tien. He walked into his personal quarters.

* * *

It was now two hours before Vegeta and Nappa's suspected arrival, and everyone was stronger than ever.

"We're all ready for this, right?" said Goku to the group he had assembled - Tien, Krillin, Yamcha, Kami, Piccolo, and Mace Windu.

"I don't think we're going to get any more so in the next few hours," Krillin quipped.

"Oh well. Kami, how's the gravity gun functioning?"

"If I can get off a clear shot, it'll liquefy any armor they're wearing," responded Kami.

"You guys remember the procedures Kami briefed us on, right?"

A round of affirmation. This was basically an extended form of what they'd applied in previous battles. Anyone significantly away from the action provided artillery, anyone who wasn't went in and made it personal. If they were showing signs of injury, they would fly away as quickly as possible for medical attention and return ASAP. This would continue until they were all dead or had subdued the enemy. It was simple and it made sense.

"We're going to try and reason with them, right?" said Piccolo.

"Yes, we only resort to force if they can't be subdued peacefully."

The time was ticking. Goku disappeared for a few minutes, then reappeared with a plate of sashimi.

"I need food to live," he explained. Nobody was impressed. And the minutes ticked down.

Soon, they saw two streaks of fire coming down from the sky.

"Alright, let's move."

* * *

Vegeta was beginning to stir from his sleep.

*Operation Dine and Dash has begun,* he thought to himself.

"We're going to wreck this planet, are we not?" shouted Nappa over the communication lines, as they plummeted past the 50km mark.

"Nappa, it's better to leave the vestiges of civilization so you can come back and wreck their day when you're feeling bitter."

"Well, we are blowing things up, right?"

"Right. A few major metropoli ought to leave them cowed and able to do our bidding. Then imagine the power we could have! Legions of soldiers to back us up in battle! It'd give us a shot of usurping the Trade Federation! You always wanted to become a Super Saiyan, did you not?"

"...You know what, Vegeta? Fuck you and your delusions of grandeur. Go do your stupid fiefdom shit on your own. I'm going to destroy what I want, and when I want, starting now." The trajectory of Nappa's capsule slowly diverged from that of Vegeta's, and of the world's defenses, Tien Shinhan was the first to notice.

"What are they doing?" he shouted, pointing at the space between them.

"I don't know. Do we split up or try to take one out before heading for the other?" asked Krillin.

"I say we do the latter."

"Yeah, we don't know how powerful these two are relative to us," Goku added.

"We'll go for the closer one."

And it was settled. Vegeta was rather surprised to find a group of natives following his capsule downwards, but compared to Nappa's desertion, it was barely a blip on the radar.

*I may have to kill him for his treachery. It would be rather easy, but perhaps I can divert his attention so that our interests do not conflict.*

Another thought suddenly struck him.

*I wonder what's become of Raditz and his plan to deal with Kakarrot. I hope that this 'Tao' he spoke of has not corrupted him too much.* No time for further thoughts, the capsule was decelerating on soil, which turned to rock, which was creating a huge gaping crater in the middle of nowhere-

* * *

Nappa's trajectory lead him into mountainous terrain.

*Vegeta's become quite the idiot over the last few months. I'll check on him in a week. Hopefully being on an actual planet will clear his mind, but if not, I'll have to kill him.*

Like Vegeta, he too was being followed.

"I have no way of knowing for sure whether this is Vegeta or Nappa, but either will be of great use to us," Tao informed Raditz, as they descended the last few thousand feet.

"I can beat both of them at once with my arms tied behind my back! They won't be that useful," Raditz sneered. They watched the capsule plunge into the ground - once it had decelerated completely, they entered the crater. Soon, they found Nappa crawling out.

"Where's your partner Vegeta?" sneered Tao.

"We had a falling out," Nappa explained. Then he did a double take. "I've waited an entire year to kill you, Tao!" He burst out of the capsule and tackled the poor fellow. However, before he could inflict further damage, Raditz grabbed hold of his arms and immobilized them. He then tried to kick at Raditz, who merely swiveled out of the way.

"A rare display of altruism from Raditz. You see, he loathes my presence, but I am apparently useful enough to him that my survival is ensured for the next few days." Tao had smashed into the walls of the crater - had his head not been reinforced with composite metal, he'd have at least been knocked unconscious.

"Damn straight," shouted Raditz.

"Raditz, let me go! He's a filthy human! I want to kill him now! Kakarott was supposed to kill everyone, and clearly it hasn't happened!" Nappa screamed, his blood pressure rising to unhealthy levels.

"Hey Nappa, you should shut up. I defeated an alternate universe version of you, and I'm pretty sure I can also beat the real thing."

"This is all your fault, Tao! You've driven him to madness... and apparently increased his strength a great deal... you're Satan, aren't you?"

"I have a lot to explain to you," Tao intoned. "If you are willing to listen to me, I'm sure you'll find our proposals interesting."

If only he could read Nappa this very fanfiction.

* * *

Vegeta's introduction to the Dragon World was much gentler by comparison.

"Greetings, Kakarot," he said to Goku, who was lucky enough to be standing directly in front of the door of Vegeta's capsule. "I am Vegeta, and I'm a Saiyan warrior just like you."

"I-"  
Goku's response was preempted by Kami.

"Why have you come to this planet?"

"I merely wish to visit peacefully and sample its food. You see, I am a gourmand and-" The eyes stared at him.

"You're not serious," Goku said after a while.

"I beg your pardon?"

"My name's not Kakarot. It's actually Son Goku. Raditz told me the same thing, but he was clearly lying."

"... right. I have a lot to explain to you. Why don't we find a nice restaurant and get reacquainted? You haven't been on your home planet since you were just an infant, and so much has happened in the interim."

*He seems peaceful,* thoughtspoke Goku to Kami.

*He is employing multiple layers of protection against scrying. I don't know his motivations, but if we keep him occupied, maybe I can have Mr. Popo attempt it. Why don't you take him to the Gigantic Rice Bowl? You guys seem to enjoy that place.* Goku was silent for an extended period as he absorbed Kami's transmission. When he noticed Vegeta was staring at him oddly, he shook his head violently.

"Sorry, I zoned out for some reason. If you want a good restaurant, we should go to the Gigantic Rice Bowl. The food's great, and it's a buffet."

"It's alright. If the food is even half as good as you say, then my time here will be productive."

* * *

Having restrained Nappa sufficiently, Tao slowly told him what had occured in the last year, taking time to relish every syllable; it was a rare luxury.

"You're lying," Nappa stage whispered moments after Tao had finished.

"Why would I lie to you?"

"You have so much to gain from it..."

"He's not lying, you hear?" And Raditz twisted Nappa's arms with intent of causing pain. Said pain brought a grimace to Nappa's face.

"Raditz, stop doing that. Pain will only make him struggle more."

"I'd like to see him try," sneered Raditz.

"You see, Vegeta would not hestitate to kill you if you were to fail him, like you are doing as we speak. I'm not that foolish."

"What? Even the one I know wouldn't be that dumb!"

"Read the book." And Tao held the huge volume of Akira Toriyama's manga in front of Nappa, who stared at his own depiction.

"Look, don't let it get to you. I think he just forged the thing so he could manipulate people," whispered Raditz in Nappa's ear.

"Why do you follow him if he is given so much to deception?" Nappa responded.

"It makes me stronger."

Nappa continued staring at his battle with Goku.

"You made this all up, didn't you?" he shouted at Tao. "I would never lose to Kakarot in real life! I wouldn't overreact to his claimed power level! This guy doesn't even look like me!"

"Occam's Razor," was Tao's pithy response.

"What?"

"It means that the most likely solution is often the simplest one. Is it more likely that I am telling the truth about this, or that I quickly wrote and drew a story of you losing to my strongest opponent for the sole purpose of allying you to me?"

"Well, it worked on his brother here. But you know Raditz was always the runt of the bunch."

"You know what, Nappa? It's your turn to be the runt," Raditz said, before throwing Nappa back into the crater his capsule had excavated. The sheer force of the blow knocked him unconscious.

"Well, when he wakes up, he'll either capitulate, or kill everyone with his newfound strength. Find me some sort of rope, Raditz and tie him up so tightly that you couldn't even get out if you were in a similar predicament."

* * *

At the Gigantic Rice Bowl, the atmosphere was far more pleasant. The staff didn't sneer at the customers, and the customers didn't give each other savage beatings.

"You see, as a result of the rather unfortunate genocide of our species, Saiyan policy has changed on the crucial issues of war and peace. I would rather peacefully coexist with intelligent species... especially if their culture is as refined as this planet's is," Vegeta said, over a plate of tuna sashimi.

*If this planet's cuisine is anything similar to this establishment, these people are middling at best. On the other hand, their warriors seem fairly competent,* he thought to himself.

"How complimentary of you," responded Tien.

"Clearly, Son Goku here has adopted a new name to fit his identity as a defender of your peoples. If he were not on your side, you would be on the brink of perdition."

"Yeah, but most of the Earthers are nice people. And I only use force when it is neccesary," Goku added.

"I imagine he has a lot of unspent vigor from his Saiyan heritage. It would explain his frequent role in these Budokai tournaments you speak of."

"I won the 23rd one, you know. I would've entered the 24th, but I've got a son to raise."

"Right. I'm not sure how you did it, unless a female Saiyan escaped the destruction of the planet."

"I don't think Chi Chi is a Saiyan... but..."

Vegeta's jaw dropped.

"You don't know very much about biology, do you?"

"Well, he's a nice kid. I'll have to send him to a pretty expensive school so he gets the most out his brain. It's pretty big, far as I know."

"Never expressed an interest in martial arts?"

"Apparently he fancies himself a chemist."

"Interesting." It's not like they could expect Gohan to be a fighter, as the greatest threat to his vitality so far (Raditz) had become sidetracked.

Silence for a while.

"I sure wish I could go after Frieza for what he did to my people, but I don't think I'm strong enough. And I'm pretty sure I'm stronger than you." Vegeta said after a while. Goku laughed at him.

"Yeah, and I'm the Empress of Japan. Got any more wacky ideas?"

"Well, maybe you could still help me. Our people died needlessly."

"If it didn't mean leaving Tao and Raditz a free pass to this world-" Goku's friends stared frigidly at him.

"Sorry! But I thought a lot of you guys would want to come and that could cause problems."

"Clearly we should handle them first. I assume Nappa and Raditz share the grudge against Frieza, because we worked together for many years."  
"Right. What about repopulating this Saiyan race?"

"Well, I could go to Wacken and fuck lots of women. I guess." More staring.

"Saiyan humor. It's not very funny to outsiders," Vegeta explained. "Anyways, I need to go find Nappa and Raditz and see if they are willing to remain on my side." He fidgeted around in his pockets momentarily.

"I almost forgot - I doubt I have anything that could be considered currency on this planet, so it looks like you'll be paying the bills." In one motion, he stood up, and dashed out of the premises so quickly that even Goku could barely perceive his motion. Needless to say, it was several seconds before reality remembered that Vegeta had disturbed countless air molecules and allowed for a shockwave.

"What the hell was that?" shouted the proprietor of the restaurant.

"He forgot that you pay in advance, right?" Krillin sneered.

"We'd better go after him and make sure he doesn't get himself hurt," responded Goku, who grabbed a couple of beef ribs and gobbled them quickly, before rocketing out. A few others followed more slowly. Only Kami and Piccolo were left.

"So, watch any good movies lately?" said Kami, hoping to strike up some small chat.

"Well, Goku plunked me down in front of a TV one day and had me watch one of those Bleach movies... 'Fade to Black' or something. And I wasn't really paying attention, but I swear, I took a quick look at him and his hair was suddenly bright yellow for some reason. Then I did a double take, and it'd turned to normal. What's up with that?"

"That I have no comprehension of." Then they slowly stood up, and walked out of the buffet.

* * *

"Hey, Vegeta! Do you think you could slow down for my friends? They're kind of... not as fast as us!" Vegeta was now cruising at a "reasonable speed" (high subsonic), so Goku was able to catch up.

"I suppose I could! But they might see it as a sign of weakness!" Goku nearly fell out of the air laughing.

"Okay, I guess I'll tell them you want to get there first," he said once he recovered. He then came to a stop in midair for about a minute, after which his friends finally came up. They were visibly sweating with exertion.

"This is the fastest I've ever went in my life!" shouted Yamcha. "I clocked it! 400 miles per hour! That's almost as fast as one of my friend's Learjets go!"

"Yeah, what's up with the grueling pace?" Krillin was handling it a little better.

"Sorry. Vegeta likes to go fast. I guess he doesn't want to break the sound barrier-" Loud cracks resembling gunfire- "Or you would've heard it. I was wrong about that," Goku told the group.

"If I didn't know better, I'd say this planet is a locus of the Force itself," said Mace Windu. "I've lived several decades and only when I come here have I flown under my own power."

"Well, it's a good thing you learned how to skydance. Otherwise you might've had to take a cab," Krillin quipped.

"I can sense this Vegeta character slowing down... he's near a few people with significant power levels... and someone managed to slip through that quarantine enchantment," Tien informed the group.

"Alright, let's go at a bit more leisurely of a pace. Who knows? Vegeta might be able to bring Raditz to reason."

As it was, Vegeta was stumbling in on a rather odd scene. Tao and Raditz were conversing with a well dressed stranger, while Nappa had been hogtied with what appeared to be a large metal girder.

"Why is this man tied up in such a bizarre fashion?" said the stranger.

"Do you want to know what I would do to Raditz and this idiot if I could escape the situation they've put me in?" Nappa shouted at him.

"No, but I imagine it wouldn't be very civilized. So Tao, Raditz tells me there's some degree of bad blood between you two?"

"Tao treats me like a child!" screamed Raditz.

"Raditz has no respect for his elders," Tao responded.

"I see. Why are you two living together if you share no blood... or apparently, species relation?"

"That's what I want to know," Vegeta said, swooping in. "Raditz, what could you possibly have to do with this Mercenary Tao fellow?"

"You don't get it, do you? He knows things! He has been granted the vision of a future! He has prevented me from dying! He knew about us Saiyans without having any precedent."

"I'm not telling you again, Raditz. If you don't accept my story, it's your own damn fault-"

"Everybody, please calm down. Tao, Raditz, I can see where your ill will towards each other comes from, but you must realize that you both have valid life experience and can learn a great deal of things from each other," explained the stranger. "If there's anything I have learned from my training as a psychiatrist, it is that people can fix their problems if they take the time."

"... Go on," Tao sneered.

"Tao, Raditz may be impudent, but from what he has told me, he comes from a culture that has great respect for their elders. While they do depose those who fail, it merely ensures that the most competent rise to the top, and stay there. You are clearly competent, otherwise you would not be alive this day."

"Hah! He takes my side."

"Not entirely, Raditz. While he may not be as physically strong as you, he has apparently lived for 300 years. Even if this is an exaggeration, you could certainly stand to gain something from his wisdom and life experience. What you have adopted of his philosophy has certainly improved your life. Perhaps you could show a little gratitude?"

"I've never thought of it that way." And Raditz grudgingly bowed to Tao.

"I'll try to show more respect in the future," he said.

"Dually noted." They furitively shook hands.

Vegeta's jaw merely dropped at this.

"It goes to show that regardless of where I am, I can help people patch up their differences," the stranger gloated. "If you're ever in... my version of Seattle, tune to 780 FM for the Dr. Fraiser Crane Show. You may very well enjoy it-"

And Fraiser Crane disappeared in a flash of red, only to find himself facing a jaundiced man with a gigantic sprout of red hair, and a variety of less interesting humans he didn't recognize in an entirely white space.

"Ah, the guest of honor has arrived!" the stranger said, reaching (jerkily) to shake Fraiser's hand.

"Where am I? I know that the freak dimensional travel can often blow one off course, but this place is fundamentally absurd!" shouted Mr. Crane.

"This is a dimension where characters portrayed by-" Before he could continue, someone whispered something in his ear.

"Look, if I announce it to the world, a minor cataclysm will inconvenience one of the creator gods, so I'll just whisper it in your ear." And so, the man explained to Fraiser.

"... I see. Well, this is indeed a very disturbing universe... and a rather dubious honor. I imagine that I'll be home later."

* * *

"What the hell was that?" shouted Vegeta, once Fraiser Crane had disappeared.

"It was good advice, now that I think of it. Considering that I'm living with Tao, I should at least be civil to him. Right?" Raditz responded.

"In the same way that you would be civil to Frieza, before you disemboweled him. Do you hear what I just implied? Subdue him!"

"No!"

"Clearly you are not worth his attention, whoever you may be," sneered Tao, twirling his mustache as if he were Snidely Whiplash. "Now we have to deal with Son Goku before he becomes a threat to us. Are you interested in joining our little group?"

"Kakarot is only a threat you because you are undermining reality itself."

"Are we? Besides the existence of this book, it has been Goku and his friends who rushed through dimensions seeking weapons to 'stop' us, and therefore damage the sanctity of our universe. Maybe you should consider that?"

"Any damage they deal is insignificant in the face of your meddling." With this, Vegeta slowly moved towards Nappa's makeshift prison, and started twisting the girder away from him. Nappa was able to move his right arm before anyone tried to stop Vegeta. In this case, it was Tao, who had quietly drawn the knife concealed in his canon, and stabbed Vegeta in the neck. Before he could even draw blood, Vegeta had blinked behind Tao and knocked him to the ground.

It was about now that Raditz decided to assault Vegeta, concentrating all his energy into one huge punch. Suprisingly, it hit Vegeta's armor, which absorbed the force as if it'd merely been lightly prodded.

"Ha ha ha! My armor is impenetra-ouch!" Had Vegeta not taken the time to boast, Raditz's next punch would have missed his jaw by a mile. Being relatively competent, Vegeta merely punched back instead of acting indigniant, confused, or even complain about pain. Raditz punched again, Vegeta blocked, and so forth. Mercenary Tao facepalmed, and was feeling the vague urge to offer boxing style commentary, but his train of thought was interrupted by the screech of twisting steel.

"I'm getting out of here," Nappa helpfully explained, as he managed to free his left arm. "Clearly, nobody here is trustworthy, least of all that fellow who's brainwashed Raditz and Tao into being buttbuddies-"

For that, Tao punched him in the jaw. It might not have been the best idea, as Nappa screamed obscenities at him, ripped the remaining metal away from his legs, and (I shit you not) bit down into Tao's armored cranium. Tao's response to this was to flail around insanely, attempting to shake him off. If this didn't work, maybe punching Nappa's skull in might dissuade further attempts.

Before anyone could reach decisive combat results, Goku's entourage conveniently flew in and landed. Needless to say, they had trouble believing their eyes.

"What the hell is going on?" Krillin shouted.

"Should we be filming this?" sneered Tien Shinhan.

"I guess we should help Vegeta, but whose side is he on?"


	12. Altered Focus

Everyone stared at each other. It took a moment for someone to break the ice.

"Should I place a bet on the winner?" quipped Tien Shinhan.

"Yeah, bet on me!" Raditz yelled back at him. "And Tao, I guess." Tao merely nodded at him.

"That wouldn't be a good idea, Raditz," said Vegeta, for some reason pretending to smoke a cigarette. "You see, your continued allegiance to Mercenary Tao isn't a particularly good idea. You certainly should desert them."

"Yeah, he's warping reality," Goku added. In response to this, Nappa let go of Tao's head.

"This wouldn't have happened if you had conquered the planet like you were supposed to, Kakarot!" Nappa's exclamation was technically true, but failed to account for most of the important events of the last year.

"Whatever. You should help Vegeta detain the two."

"I'm not helping anyone here! You're a traitor, Raditz is a traitor, Vegeta is an ideological traitor, and you can all go to hell!" Nappa flew off to destinations unknown.

"How are you an ideological traitor?" Goku asked Vegeta. Before Vegeta could answer, Raditz punched him in the jaw.

"You're making the afflicted area swell," said Vegeta in the snidest fashion possible, before returning the favor. Goku, feeling sympathy for the charismatic Saiyan, rushed at Raditz, and tackled him, bringing them both to the ground.

"DODUN RAY!" Before Goku could grapple, he found the yellow beam had the unpleasant effect of concussing him. Vegeta grabbed Raditz by the shoulder, dragged him up, and kneed him in the head before he could take advantage of this.

"I guess we should occupy Tao's attention," Krillin muttered. The others nodded at this; Mace Windu ignited his lightsaber, and charged Tao alongside Krillin. The other four of the group (Yamcha, Tien, Kami, Piccolo) began emitting energy blasts and sharp objects into the fight.

"Go around! You're not going to get a clean shot off at that angle!" Vegeta shouted at Tien.

"I'm shooting to confuse, not to cause physical harm!" responded Tien from a distance.

"You fool! You just ruined your own strategy!" Tao launched a Dodun ray at Tien, making him fall out of the sky. This was temporary. Despite being assaulted by 6 people (although one was merely making their presence felt with spikes and blades conjured out of thin air), Tao was actually holding his ground. After blasting Tien, he'd swapped out his gun for a knife and was making wide swipes at Mace Windu's lightsaber. It contacted several times, but the lightsaber held up due to its construction.

"DESTRUCTO DISC!" Krillin shouted, launching his trademark energy attack at Tao from what was most likely far too close a distance. This was effortlessly absorbed, and Krillin received several kicks in his direction for the transgression. After executing some fancy back flips, he kicked Tao in the back of the head. The armor made a strange clunking sound and began emitting tinny music. Nobody expected that.

" 'Summer Is Icumen In?' Seriously? Couldn't we get something a little more trendy?" Krillin sneered. Apparently the music player agreed, as it started emitting generic synthpop.

"I'm sorry, but the track you requested is not in the public domain. IF yOU WISHTOchooseanOTHERtrack spEak n-" Tao shook his head violently, dispelling the announcer. No time to dwell on the event or its cause. He used the ensuing confusion to rush Kami and knock him out of the air. When Piccolo saw this, he had the time to come up to Tao and get in a few solid punches before he too fell unconscious.

"I believe I have just won," snarled Tao. Unfortunately, he hadn't been paying attention to Raditz, and was surprised when the Saiyan cannonballed into him. Before either of them could stand, or at least attempt to defend themselves on the ground, Tien launched a few strategic punches at their joints, essentially immobilizing them. They were soon surrounded, and certainly in no position to fight.

A few dozen feet away, Vegeta was gesturing to Goku.

"Did you see that? He thought I was going to punch him in the face, so he blocked there. Then you kicked him in the solar plexus, and when he moved his hands down to defend that, I grabbed them and threw him at Tao! Aren't I a tactical genius, Kakarot?"

"Maybe you'd win a game of shogi or something. But I'm still physically stronger." They sauntered over to where Raditz and Tao were lying in a heap, conscious, but not showing any signs of resistance.

*I should've known that if I let them fight me all at once, something bad would've happened!* Tao thought to himself. He whispered in Raditz's ear.

"If you get up, they will gib you faster than you can say, 'I challenge you to a duel!'" Raditz grimaced at this, but he didn't launch an attack.

"Well, it appears that the unraveler of the universes isn't so intimidating in combat," sneered Vegeta.

"What's your point?" Tao asked him.

"Nothing. It's just that you'd expect something so dangerous to be a little more imposing. But a cyborg? That's not going to get you very far."

"Technically, Raditz provides the muscles."

"He put up a good fight until he was dumb." Raditz's right eyelid was twitching. It took all of his willpower to avoid attacking his new captors.

* * *

It was clear that due to the combined strength of Goku and Vegeta, Tao and Raditz had been demoted from antagonists to slight annoyance, and that their real threat was far more nebulous and unconfrontable. Even Raditz realized this, and he was going insane with jealousy. Vegeta had suggested that Tao and Raditz be executed for their deeds, but this was an extremely unpopular proposal.

"Vegeta, our justice system works on the idea that a man can redeem himself. Why don't we just imprison them and hire a psychiatrist for them?" Krillin informed him when he'd provided the initial idea.

"Hah! Don't make me laugh. These are deranged homicidal maniacs we're dealing with here, as opposed to demure schizophrenics or small time thieves."

"If you try to kill them, you'll probably meet with much resistance from the populace, anyways." The debate continued on in this vein for a while.

"How do you know you have a prison strong enough to contain them?" Vegeta asked Krillin after some time.

"Well, I don't know about that, but I imagine that the threat of being effortlessly disposed of might keep them somewhat complacent."

After some time, this was agreed to be an acceptable temporary solution, useful for about a year or so.

"Even if they escape, they'll be relatively weaker compared to you, so it should be okay."

At this point, Goku walked in on them, barely swallowing a stray rice ball before talking.

"Wait a minute. Shouldn't we give them a fair trial before even considering a punishment?" he asked Vegeta, who grimaced at his proposition.

"... Okay, fine. But it's going to be a formality, since there's damning evidence against them and I doubt they can talk their way out of it," Vegeta responded.

So they gave Tao and Raditz a "trial". They were forcefully seated in front of a judge and surrounded by bailiffs (these were a token measure), who spoke at length on the damages they had caused in Kyoto, and their willful endangerment of life. Because this was supposed to be a fair trial, the judge then displayed video clips of the attack, as well as their fight against Kami's entourage.

"Before we announce your sentencing, is there anything you would like to say?" the judge inquired. There was no response. The jury deliberated for a very short period, proclaimed Tao and Raditz to be guilty, and the judge sentenced them to life imprisonment. An open and shut case.

Outside the courthouse, Goku spoke with Kami.

"I've heard that the red flashes are down significantly. That means the spell your acolytes are channeling is effective, right?" Goku said. He scratched the breast of his suit - being used to martial arts outfits, he'd had trouble putting it on, and found the thick wool quite unpleasant.

"It's very effective. If even a novice at magic were to mutter an incantation for two months on end, the ensuing effect would be immense. They'd probably also go insane from the effort."

"How long until it reaches its maximum power?"

"Mr. Popo suggests it may take a full year. Even then, exceptionally powerful beings may be able to travel through the border at will. Still, that'll rule out most of the randomness."

"Well, that's good for us. But what about other universes?"

"I don't know-" Kami's cellphone rang.

"Hold a second." Kami brought it out. A text message.

"Now that you're maintaining the border, I guess I'll go into hibernation." And Kami took the opportunity to grimace.

"Oh good. Ms. Yakumo is shirking her duties. I may have to demote her and replace her with someone with a work ethic," he informed Goku.

"Yeah, that sounds bad. She's the supervising technician on that spell you were talking about. Right?"

"If she keeps causing problems like this, she is unlikely to stay that way. I'd best go." And Kami flew off. Goku took the opportunity to dive into a nearby alley, and change out of his suit.

"Why are you naked in an alleyway?" Apparently Chi Chi had stumbled in upon him, just seconds before he could don his preferred attire.

"That's exceptionally poor judgement, even for you." Luckily, Goku had pulled on his underwear by now, otherwise he would've been arrested for indecent exposure.

"Is there anything I can say that won't make this worse?"

"Finish dressing. It's your turn to pick up Gohan from school, and I don't think having the body of a Chippendale justifies strutting around in the nude."

* * *

It was a few days after the trial, and Nappa was preparing dinner with long distance tenderization.

*It's crude, but refined culinary tools go against everything Saiyans stand for,* he'd thought to himself, before dropping a giant boar from several hundred feet. He'd considered eating it alive, but somehow, that would be even worse.

Besides, unlike Raditz, Nappa preferred his meat rare.

If you knew how to make fire and had strength beyond the wildest dream of any animal on the Dragon World, surviving on the plains was almost pathetically easy. Thriving was slightly harder. Regulating food intake to the point of ketosis and heightened spiritual awareness, though, was paradoxically the hardest of all for a Saiyan. Nappa'd come up with the plan on his own - set a good example for Vegeta, and he would see the errors of his ways and return to the traditional Saiyan lifestyle. Drawing Vegeta's attention would be the most difficult part, but Nappa felt that drawing into these rareified heights of mysticism (What? It's not like Saiyans have very developed spirituality) would lend him magical power that Saiyans never bothered with.

He saw something flash through his vision, and a voice told him it was up to no good. It was effortlessly caught. Nappa opened his left hand to find what appeared to be a crushed insect.

*Why would an insect of this size be a threat?* Then his mind flashed back to what Vegeta had told him of parasites.

"Sure, you can keep one or two on you without even noticing as it lives off your body. But they reproduce. Pretty soon, they're expanding out of control, you starve to death, and they seek new targets. Don't let anything into your body that doesn't benefit you in some way." That'd been several years back, after the genocide, but before Vegeta had developed his loathing of Frieza. When they weren't busting planets, Vegeta was mining the organization's libraries for information. A bookish Saiyan was fundamentally absurd, but the situation could be overlooked, as the knowledge always came in handy. In retrospect, Nappa should've seen the signs-

"Let me get this straight. This is the warrior who disdainfully wrecks my surveillance device when those years ahead of him fail to notice?" In the intervening period, a man had walked up to Nappa and was studying him as if he were to be on a test. He was old, he was tired, and Nappa couldn't help but get the feeling he'd lost something very dear to him and was scarred for life. Notably, he didn't flinch as Nappa tore huge strips of flesh from the boar's carcass.

"Most people say 'Hello' first."

"No need for formalities. I am Doctor Gero, and I specialize in the construction of androids." Nappa wasn't familiar with the term, so the doctor had to explain it to him.

"Why would you imitate a human? Saiyans are far superior."

"Or so my research on Son Goku would indicate. When he was 12, he single handedly destroyed my entire military."

"Whatever you say. He _was_ sent here to exterminate the locals."

They stared at each other for a very long time, after which Nappa aimed a small energy blast at a pile of wood he'd gathered. A few moments later, the smell of smoke and burning gristle hit Gero's nostrils.

"Can you get at Goku for me?" He abruptly asked Nappa.

"I'd rather not risk my life just so you can have your way with Goku-"

"What are you getting at?"

"Interbreeding hasn't crossed your mind, has it? That'd be an exceptionally poor idea."

Gero's jaw dropped. "Are you absolutely insane?"

"No, I'm fasting to unlock my innate powers."

Another staring bout.

"Why bother to fast? Cybernetic limbs are the true key to power as a martial artist, and I could hook you up to some if you were willing to do as I say."

"... You're the super devil, aren't you?"

"We should talk more when you've reached acceptable levels of satiety." He wandered off, leaving Nappa with much to ponder as he ate his meal.

*Maybe fasting wasn't the best idea,* he thought. Then the nutrition hit him like a sledgehammer, and he reconsidered.


	13. Generic Tournament Arc 487

Note: This is actually the longest chapter so far, even before you account for the fact I've decided to split it into two portions. I have to strike a delicate balance between describing fighting styles not entirely unlike that of DBZ and going way overboard.

I'm somewhere between halfway and 2/3rds complete, depending on the length of future chapters.

* * *

It was unbearably hot outside.

What Goku hated about heat waves was that you couldn't really run away from them. Technically, if you were a Saiyan, you could make your way to Siberia within a few hours, but eventually you'd have to come back. The logistics of moving there permanently, as well as the difficulty of carrying luggage at subsonic velocities without damaging it essentially prevented any travel. Therefore, it was a good thing that air conditioning was amongst the arts known by humanity. They also had pools, but the one in the Z Fighters' dojo ('Because we're defending against the end of the world', Kami said when he'd officially christened the group) was not very entertaining. Sure, you could get in, but a dozen students were doing underwater aerobics, and their splashing was turning the pool into a maelstrom so violent that it would've considered Scylla and Charybdis a light snack.

By the power of these factors combined, Goku was rendered a customer at the cafeteria they'd recently added to the place. The food wasn't great, but it was cheap, and that was good enough. Besides, for Saiyans, eating was a form of recreation.

"Launch anything into orbit lately?" sneered a familiar voice. Vegeta sat down at Goku's table.

"Hah! Launching stuff into orbit is for novices. I bet I could throw something to the moon." Goku and Vegeta's boasting got more absurd by the day, but so did their feats of strength.

"Most likely, it'd burn up in the atmosphere first." Further outlandish speculation was preempted by traditional Saiyan gorging.

"You know how one of my purposes on this planet is to recruit warriors to attack Frieza? I just had the idea that we could run a tournament to bring all the strongest warriors together," Vegeta said after some time.

"Well, I do like myself an occasional tournament," responded Goku.

"Great, I guess you're in favor. Do tell Kami or whoever's REALLY in charge around here." So Goku did tell Kami, who was initially ambivalent.

"It seems as if this would be a particularly efficient way to sort through recruits for Vegeta's ambitions. However, you shouldn't forget that while Vegeta is our friend, he is not our ally." This confused Goku.

"Wait, what? There's a difference?"

"Since I can't scry him, I've had to observe and inference from his words and actions. His ambition is through the roof, and he may fancy himself an absolute monarch. With any luck, he won't have any reason to turn on us."

"Right. So we can have the tournament, right?"

"In the interest of keeping him happy, yes." Had they turned him down, Vegeta probably would've just run the tournament himself. As it was, he informed Kami that he was going to enter it.

"Of course he recommended you not do so, Vegeta. It's very unusual for someone to fight in a tournament they themselves arranged," Goku told him a few days later, just before the media buzz would explode.

"Well, I want to appraise some of the fighters myself. Besides, that's also why I asked for the 3 strike system. If the Legendary Super Saiyan himself managed to lose to a Boggle playing chicken because of foul play or something, I wouldn't want his chances ruined for it."

"When you put it that way, it sounds very rational."

A few hours, they walked outside the dojo. A sea of reporters awaited them."

"I'll handle it," Vegeta announced. It was fairly obvious that the reporters wanted to know about the tournament, but they didn't ask any interesting questions. At least for a while. Then they dissipated, leaving a small boy wearing what appeared to be Saiyan armor over a pink shirt and yellow pants.

"It was 'Wacky Tacky Day' at Orion Middle School, in case you have to ask," rationalized the boy.

"Oh, hey, Trucks. It's been a while since we last met. Anything interesting happen with you?" Goku responded.

"I heard that you guys know where the 7 Dragon Balls are, and that they're available for wishing. You guys going to do anything with them?"

"Look, kid. I don't know who the hell you are, or how you got here, but you should be doing your homework or playing baseball instead of searching for Dragon Balls," Vegeta snarled.

"Gee, you're nasty. Oh well. It matches up with your behavior in the anime." Trucks turned to leave. Then he suddenly turned back.

"I heard that some new company is going to take over the dubbing of the show. Have your voices changed lately?" Goku chuckled.

"The last time my voice changed was during puberty. I was surprised too," was his jovial response.

"Oh. Well, I have to get back home, or my parents will be mad at me. See you around." And he walked into the distance.

"... That was weird. I think that kid needs psychological help or something," Vegeta said, once Trucks seemed to be out of hearing distance.

"I don't know. He seems pleasant and well adjusted enough, outside of thinking our world to be entertainment."

* * *

It was at this point that Trucks began visiting on a regular basis.

"My parents say I can watch the tournament if I ace my history test," he explained one day.

"That's cool of them. But I sure hope they send someone to watch over you in case someone unsavory does something criminal," Krillin responded. Outside of Goku, Krillin seemed to have the friendliest relations with the kid. Vegeta and Piccolo thought he was insane, Chi-Chi thought he was a bad influence on Gohan, Gohan didn't think he approached academics with the proper level of respect, Kami thought of him as just another child, and so forth.

"They're having my older brother James come along. Not sure why, because he thinks Dragon Ball Z is stupid. But he'll protect me." The conversation continued on in this vein for some time. When Goku walked in, they were talking about television.

"Oh yeah. There's this show called Bleach that my older brother is obsessed with. It's like Dragon Ball Z dragged through a funhouse mirror, except not nearly as cool."

"Bleach? Me and my son Gohan think that show's awesome! It does weird things to my physical appearance when I watch it, though," Goku exclaimed when the topic was brought up. Further conversation. Luckily (?) for Trucks and Krillin, they'd chosen an area of high traffic. When Mace Windu entered the area, hoping to get to a lecture on time, Trucks' eyes literally bulged out.

"Mace Windu? What are you doing in Dragon Ball Z?" he shouted. Mace Windu looked at him as if he were Darth Vader.

"That is a question that I still have no adequate answer to."

"Didn't you die when Anakin cut off your hand and then Darth Sidious fried you with the really cool Force Lightning?" Mass silence.

"Too soon?"

No response, and Windu continued on towards his destination.

"You didn't tell me Dragon Ball Z takes place in the same universe as Star Wars!" Trucks told Krillin.

"I have no idea what that's supposed to mean. He's planning to travel back home when we take care of Frieza."

If anything, Trucks was controversial.

* * *

The day of the tournament arrived. The first 1,024 people to arrive were signed up, and some of them were displaced victims of the warp plague. Therefore, mixed in with the humans and the anthropomorphic animals were... more humans and anthropomorphic animals. Surprising, if one wasn't familiar with one of the warp plague's side effects - causing its victims to take on the characteristics of beings from that universe.

Luckily for readers, all those universes were fictional.

Vegeta had rejected the arena used in the World Martial Arts Tournament as 'boring' and 'unrealistic'. Instead, he'd located a large indoor stadium used for basketball, and ordered a variety of obstructions placed throughout its length.

"Why is everything covered in in rubber?" he'd been asked on various occasions.

"Because it makes things interesting. And besides, real battles aren't fought on a flat rectangle," was his response.

He'd ordered thick walls to be placed around the arena, which were also to be coated in rubber.

"Are you sure you don't have a fetish?" inquired Piccolo one day.

"Of course not. I just think the bouncing will make things more interesting for the viewers."

"More like listeners. How do you expect people to see what's going on?"

"Cameras." At this point, several dozen men entered the building, carrying a flat screen monitor each.

"It's also safer for the audience. I expect, nay, I hope that all the fighting is going to be amazingly brutal, especially if I'm competing like I plan to."

Ominous words. The prospects of a powerful alien competing in a martial arts tournament of its own design were commercially lucrative, to say the least. The 5,000 tickets to the event had sold out almost instantaneously, and the company responsible for streaming the event over the internet had to buy new servers despite the fact that it was also going to be broadcast free over many television networks. The betting on the event alone was shuffling more money than the economy of Estonia, and the merchandise was selling decently as well.

In a seedy bar somewhere in upstate New York, drunkards were discussing the odds.

"I bet Son Goku wins this tournament. He's competed three times and done surprisingly well," said one.

"Yeah, you always bet on the Asian ones. I bet one of our boys beats the alien guy," a surly one responded.

"Like who? In the last two tournaments, I don't think anyone in the US or Europe even made it into the finals."

"So? This time we have an ace up our sleeves. They say he comes from 'Springfield', but not which state..."

Back in Japan, Kami was discussing a matter of utmost importance with the four men composing what had decided to call itself the "Rainey Street Defense Force".

"Your job is to neutralize anything that threatens the audience of the tournament, whether it's a ticket-holder or a champion. Try to keep the lethality down so that you don't end up causing more problems than you solve," he told them.

"Look, Kami. We're trained professionals. Bill here has served in the army, and Boomhauer's a Texas ranger. I'd like to think we're competent for the job," said Hank to Kami.

"I get it. The portion about doing your jobs well is standard boilerplate. The last group I interviewed for the position was more interested in killing people than protecting them."

"Yeah, whatever. Let's move." They moved.

* * *

Before the tournament could start properly, a great deal of elimination rounds had to occur. As was par for Budokai course, these took place off-site in an enclosed facility. These were also filmed, and had more typical rules.

"If you set foot outside the ring, you lose. If you're knocked unconscious for more than 10 seconds, you lose. If you forfeit, you obviously lose. Equipment rules and strike rules are the same as in the Budokai. If you're still fighting after 1 minute, your ring will shrink until one of you is outside of it," intoned the PA system. "Paper copies of the rules are placed on the walls."

The elimination process began without a hitch. Vegeta was one of the first to compete, and his opponent was a giant bear.

"Good luck," he said after the bell rang. Then he leisurely walked over to the bear, picked it up effortlessly, and then gently lowered it outside the ring, despite the bear's efforts to harm him.

"Damn it all!" the bear shouted after being deposited outside the ring. "Well, at least I'm not out of the running yet," he said. But his humiliating defeat did not go unnoticed. At least 20 of the fighters tried to imitate Vegeta's 'stratagem', but most of them failed, simply because they were much less powerful fighters relative to their opponents. The first to succeed caught Tien Shinhan's eye - it was the same lady who kept challenging him for the role of the Crane School instructor. She'd tried again soon after the tournament was announced, using fighting tactics shamelessly ripped from the Saiyans, and Tien had to improvise a way to counter them. At least they'd be helpful if he fought against Goku.

"I can still win, I haven't been eliminated yet" became one of the mantras of this portion of the tournament, and viewers (as well as the producers of the TV broadcast) lapped up the sheer chutzpah of some of the fighters.

A few concrete examples:

- A stereotypical '98 pound nerd' vs a hulking giant of a man. The giant lost because he rushed to tackle the nerd out of the ring, overcompensated on the speed, and ran out because his opponent had the time to take a few steps to the left.

- Goku's first battle, against the previous tournament winner, Mr. Satan. They both sized each other up for a few seconds. Then, Goku broke the ice.

"Is it just me, or do you bear an uncanny resemblance to King Chappa?" he shouted.

"How am I supposed to know-" Mr. Satan finished his statement from outside the ring.

"Hah! It's funny because you'd think he would know more about the previous winners of the tournament." With this, Goku wandered off to the concessions stand and ordered some wasabi peas.

After a few hundred contestants had been eliminated, the battles became less quick and decisive, and more deranged.

- A human named George with a constantly changing facial expression versus what appeared to be another human with the lower body of a yak. George, figuring he had nothing to lose, started jumping around in circles around the yaktaur, which couldn't quite keep up. Eventually he closed in, and they both started firing huge punches at each other. Then, George grabbed the yaktaur's shoulders, somersaulted over it, and eventually landed behind the yaktaur, where he was unceremoniously kicked. But before he could fly out of the ring, a massive voice screeched, "NO! MY BELOVED TEDDY BEAR!". Instead of moving outside the ring, George soared upwards, and then found himself about 10 feet above the yaktaur. After flailing about a bit, he managed to spin down and piledrive the yaktaur into, if not oblivion, at least defeat.

George exhaled in relief. It'd probably be a while until he was needed again for another battle, so he figured that he'd at least break to use the bathroom-

"XOM IS BORED." He burst into flames and was never seen again.

- Piccolo vs a fellow known only as Armripper Bludgeonface.

"I'm going to rip your arm out and beat you to death with it," said Armripper. It was clear where he got his nickname.

"Yeah, go ahead. Try it. I'm feeling charitable," Piccolo sneered, before extending his right arm. His opponent slowly walked up to him, rotated the offered arm slightly, and then yanked with all his might. The ensuing amputation (if one could call it that) was messy, if anything. Armripper then fulfilled his surname by whacking Piccolo repeatedly on the head for about a minute.

"Why won't you die already?" he screamed, showing visible exhaustion. Then the ring began shrinking. Piccolo walked to the center of it, and once the edge caught up with Armripper (who was still feebly beating away), Piccolo shoved him out of the ring.

"By the way, Namekians can regenerate their limbs," he muttered. About 30 seconds of effort later, Piccolo had done so.

Elsewhere, Goku was talking to Vegeta. They did that fairly often these days.

"Do you think it's wrong to toy with our opponents?" Vegeta asked Goku.

"Well, they tend to be good sports about it, and this is a tournament. But I don't know."

They were down to 100 contestants now. The deranged phase was over, and now the competence was quickly rising. The referees called a brief break for lunch. The primary Z-Fighters were all still in the running, but odds were that sooner or later, someone would be eliminated.

"I wouldn't worry about it, if anyone's planning to do so. We're doing pretty well to get this far," said Goku to his friends at the table. On the other hand...

*I think I can win this thing. I've faced so many opponents already and I'm still not breaking a sweat!* Goku thought to himself. *Good thing this is just a friendly tournament, otherwise I'd feel bad about how I'm about to pummel my friends.* As this thought formed in his head, his facial expressions tended towards the infamous trollface. Luckily, nobody recognized it.

Vegeta was also thinking about the tournament.

*Most likely, I'll either have to face Kakarott, Piccolo, or Tien. I obviously know how to fight against Saiyans, and I think I fought against some Nameks a few years ago, but Tien might bring some unconventional tactics to the table. Then again, he's definitely physically weaker than the other two. Either way, it'll be interesting. Then all the pieces will be in place.*  
Vegeta was also 'trollfacing'. Unfortunately, his internal monologue was interrupted, as everyone else was busy gasping at a newcomer who had walked by their table.

"Oh, grow up. It's just Nappa," he snarled at them. Then, his next words took on a more benign tone. "What have you been up to?"

"I've been tapping into eerie powers that Saiyans have wrongly considered useless and obsolete for centuries," responded Nappa, in similar tones.

"Why would centuries of Saiyan knowledge turn out to be wrong?"

"You'll see when I win the tournament." Everyone at the table looked at Nappa like he'd broken some horrific faux paus.

"You can't just say you're going to win the tournament and expect people to take you seriously," Vegeta sneered. "At least cite something that gives you credibility."

"I told you, I have a secret weapon otherwise lost to time that will overcome you all, should you make it far enough into the tournament. Proof enough?"

"Nappa, everyone here who's worth anything most likely has a secret weapon with which they hope to win the tournament."

"I have two secret weapons," Goku offered. Even Vegeta found this hilarious.

"Right. Anyways, they think that if they can pull out something new, or at least something that isn't well known, that they can throw off their enemy for long enough to get in a decisive attack. You know what I'm saying?"

"Well, duh. But mine will work, and theirs won't," boasted Nappa.

"Newsflash, Nappa. Everyone else thinks that too."

"I have two in case the first doesn't work," Goku laughed.

"You'll have to forgive Kakarott; he appears to be a clown. I wasn't aware that you were in the tournament until now. But whatever. Good luck... I guess."

Nappa had nothing to say to this, and stormed off.

*Not noticing his presence on the rosters was a serious oversight,* Vegeta thought to himself.

*Cool, this Nappa guy is in the tournament. Might make a fun challenge if I get matched up against him,* thought Goku, who still didn't quite have a proper grasp on who Nappa actually was.

As a matter of fact, Goku did not get matched up against Nappa during the final period of the eliminations. His final opponent, in fact, was Chiaotzu, and the battle they fought was fairly mundane, despite the possibilities that Chiaotzu's psychic powers offered him. Goku almost immediately found his limbs bent at odd angles and his face partially paralyzed, and the fight boiled down to whether he could land a blow on his physically frail enemy before he was lifted into the air and thrown out of the ring. He did, but even if he hadn't, it would only be his first strike. Chiaotzu was eliminated.

Krillin had the dubious honor of fighting Nappa for the 8th slot. Like Chiaotzu, he had 2 strikes beforehand.

"I really have nothing to say," he muttered as they were entering the ring.

"Good. Don't waste your energy."

The battle was unusually brief for being so far into the tournament. Krillin initiated with his trademarked "Destructo Disk", which he curiously fired behind himself. Specifically, it was curious until Nappa materialized right in its path, and was bisected and seemingly killed by it.

"...That's not physically capable of happening," Krillin muttered at the complete lack of blood. It was less wasteful than shouting about illusions.

"Indeed it isn't," a voice said in front of him. It turns out that Nappa had thought one step ahead in the metagame. One solid punch knocked Krillin out of the tournament, bringing the amount of contestants from 9 to 8, and ending the day's 'festivities'.

* * *

And so, the 8 finalists were announced, as well as the initial brackets.

1. Vegeta vs Nappa.  
2. Goku vs Homer Simpson.  
3. Tien Shinhan vs Yamcha.  
4. Piccolo vs Catherine Hoiruraito.

Tien breathed a sign of relief.

"Looks like I can go one more battle without having to worry about losing the dojo," he said to his friends. "I do not want to imagine how far the Crane School would regress if she took charge of things."

"Aren't you just delaying the inevitable?" responded Piccolo.

"... You're right. You'd better win against her." At this, Piccolo grimaced.

Already the elimination matches were racking up millions of views on the internet. Media executives worldwide agreed that the finals' combination of aliens, previous high-ranking competitors, and distinguished teachers of increasingly well known disciplines were going to push this event into the history books.

As if the competitors weren't enough, Vegeta hired the one person who arguably was responsible for all of this to do commentary.

"You mean I just have to tell people what's happening, and you'll give me a wad of cash so big I could buy a hundred... girlfriends?" asked Master Roshi when he was offered the job.

"...Right. I'll give you more cash if you're entertaining."

"I wouldn't reject the job for anything! Mostly, I've been letting my students continue the Turtle Hermit's legacy so I can enjoy my retirement, and I want to see what they've done."

The contestants were given a full extra day to rest up, and possibly further prepare themselves for the tournament.

"Remember when I said I had two secret weapons?" Goku announced to Vegeta over breakfast. "I've been catching up with some of the eliminations, and now I have three."

"That's the spirit, Kakarot." Responding logically to Goku was out of the question, so Vegeta just played along.

Master Roshi got a posh commentator's box stocked with with the necessities of perversion - beer and pornography. It also had food, for obvious reasons, and special monitors showing off the entire arena at a glance. Just before the first match, he was about to down a mug, when suddenly a thought struck him.

*Wait, I should probably be sober so that I can focus on the matches.* He put it down on a nearby table. *On the other hand, I don't see anything wrong with some aerobics ladies...* A few drops of blood oozed out of his nose.

The arena was jammed full of people, to the point that even the floor was crowded. Vegeta had foreseen this and ordered even more viewing monitors installed at various angles. Kami was worried about a potential riot; if that happened, people would be trampled and killed, so he'd given Hank and the rest of the Rainey Streeters an order that people were just beginning to notice.

"Why are all the children and seniors at the top of the bleachers?" asked someone nondescript, albeit belligerent.

"Yeah, we paid for these seats. We ought to have free choice as to where we sit," said another.

"It's a conspiracy. A good conspiracy. This way, nobody gets trampled when you decide to riot," Dale explained to the group in a cryptic fashion.

"Hey, the scrawny guy's trying to comfort us with gibberish! Let's beat him!" And half a dozen tough looking men advanced on him. The audience began shouting all sorts of insane gibberish at this.

"Shouldn't we do something?" asked Bill Dauterive from halfway across the stadium.

"No, he's fine," Hank declared. Halfway across the stadium again, Dale shouted his war cry ("POCKET SAND!") and jammed his fist into the first opponent's face. It deformed slightly, then it snapped back to its normal shape as the man was knocked off his feet, and flew several dozen feet. At this, four out of the five remaining men scattered before they got hurt. The fifth was about to attack properly, when everyone's attention was drawn to a figure floating on top of the enclosed arena.

"Hey! Spectators!" shouted Vegeta from the vantage point. "This man is here to keep you safe, and you shouldn't attack him." The fact that he was levitating in midair lent Vegeta's words credibility that merely having organized the tournament and advanced to its quarterfinals wouldn't have, and the audience calmed down.

The last leg of the tournament was to start at noon, and it was 11:57 at the moment. Master Roshi, who'd worked himself into a debauchery trance, suddenly saw this in the corner of his eye, jumped halfway out of his chair, threw his women's aerobics magazines in the corner of the room, and wiped the blood from his face. It was good timing, too, because Vegeta's face appeared on one of his screens.

"Greetings again, Master Roshi. I just wanted to inform you that the teleprompter is using this screen, instead of the one in the middle. It's a minor technical change that won't affect anything significantly," it said.

"Uh, great. I... hope you win?" This was half inquiry and half statement.

"Oh, there's no need to worry. You can root for whoever you feel like without fear of repercussions." And Roshi sighed in relief.

"Just between you and me, I hope I win." And Vegeta's face disappeared.

When 12:00 struck, a generic fanfare of trumpets filled the air, and Master Roshi began speaking a few seconds after.

"Good day to you, ladies and gentlemen! Today we bring you the last and most important rounds of the Vegeta games that will determine once and for all who is stronger... Is it the mighty Saiyan race from halfway across the galaxy? The numerous and ever so cultured humans? The Namekians, who have magical gifts beyond our wildest dreams? Either way, it looks like it's going to be rather entertaining, and fun times for all."

*Eh, it's patronizing, and most of it is soulless pap, but my speech seems to be going over well with the crowds,* Vegeta thought to himself. He'd left a few blank spaces for Roshi to ad lib, and so far, it appeared he was doing quite well.

"Our first match is between the tournament's benefactor himself, Vegeta, and another Saiyan known as Nappa, who claims that Vegeta goes against everything his race stands for. I wouldn't know myself, but this looks to be an exciting start to the GREATEST MARTIAL ARTS TOURNAMENT EVER!" Roshi was surprisingly easy going for an announcer. This would change if something stimulated his libido.

And so, Nappa and Vegeta appeared on opposite ends of the arena's roof. Both had discarded their typical Saiyan armor for unusually meaningful clothing. Vegeta, who had integrated somewhat into Earth's culture was wearing a typical karate outfit. It was presumptuous of him to include a black belt when he wasn't formally recognized by anyone on Earth, but in the words of Master Roshi, "These days, nobody seems to care!". Nappa was far different. He'd stripped down to his underwear and shoes, and painted his body with all sorts of intricate runes and abstract angular designs.

"That's not very traditional of you," Vegeta sneered at him.

"It's a logical extension of our culture. Not that you would know," Nappa scowled back. Then they were lowered into the arena, and there was no further time to banter.

"The tension is thicker than pea soup, people! Let's see how this battle goes," Roshi said to the audience. Anyone in the 'ring' would be unable to hear him, because all the materials that had gone into reinforcing the outer shell had also soundproofed it from the outside. According to Vegeta, this was intentional.

"And so it begins," Vegeta sneered at Nappa. "Tell you what. I'll allow you one free strike of your choice, so long as it doesn't break the contact rules."

Nappa didn't feel the need to question this, so he leisurely walked up to Vegeta and aimed a punch at his stomach. Two things happened at this point - first, Vegeta put his hands in a position to block it, and then Nappa stopped half an inch short of striking them.

"... You guessed I was going to block. But why waste the energy?" Vegeta asked. He was genuinely curious. Nappa opened his mouth as if he was planning to answer, but then vomited a wordless energy blast at the floor a few inches from his opponent.

"And the battle begins in earnest as Nappa seemingly violates everything we know about Newtonian physics! He's pushed himself to the other side of the arena and is literally bouncing off the walls at a velocity so high, I can barely see it!" Luckily, some skilled technician patched the monitors into a post-processed feed of the fight, making it comprehensible to the viewers. An even more proficient technician made sure the sound synced up. Inside, Vegeta had decided that the best way to handle this was spin around in place at a rapid velocity, since it was easier and safer than trying to predict Nappa's trajectory. He'd managed a few hundred revolutions when he felt a sickening blow to the top of his skull.

*Note to self: Do not continue a maneuver for more than 5 seconds,* he thought. He saw out of the corner of his eye Nappa charging an energy beam, and rushed for his solar plexus. That didn't work, because Nappa released the beam a split second before he got into melee range. When Nappa attempted to blitz him, Vegeta then tried blocking with a shield of pure ki. That didn't work because Nappa simply blinked behind him and hit his back. Somehow, Nappa was permanently one step ahead of Vegeta, and taking massive advantage of it.

*Don't lose face. It would be bad,* he thought to himself. Taunting his opponent might help.

"Oh, come on, Nappa! You're hitting like a little girl! Have you been eating properly?" This was true - Nappa was already significantly physically weaker than Vegeta, and the fasting wasn't helping. But they both knew that weak blows in adequate quantity could win a match.

"Resorting to petty insults? Clearly you've lost touch with reality!" Nappa responded. He attempted a right leglock on Vegeta, and partially failed, but briefly managed to bend the leg in a fashion that Master Roshi simply described as "painful".

"I'm putting all my money on Nappa. He's clearly craftier than his opponent," he told the audience. They agreed with him, and this echoed through the outside world as a shift in betting patterns that would influence world finance for months.

Vegeta was tiring. Every strategy was preempted, every attack was completely dodged, every attempt to block was in the wrong direction, and so forth. It was like being cherry-picked to death by the overzealous final boss of a poorly designed fighting game, and Vegeta had yet to figure out how to break the system.

*Wait a minute... that's it! Break the system!* he thought to himself. If he'd read the last sentence like this sentence implies he did, then there were numerous disturbing implications for my sanity.

It was still a solution. Vegeta simply stopped consciously thinking about beating Nappa. His attacks went in every direction, his movement was erratic, and his mind filled with simple multiplication facts. Somewhere, in an alternate dimension, Xom thought this was hilarious.

"What the hell-" Nappa began to say, as his ability to comprehend Vegeta's fighting style took a severe nosedive. Then, he got randomly punched in the face, and knocked unconscious for 15 seconds.

"I don't know why that just happened, but Vegeta is the winner!" Master Roshi shouted for dramatic effect. Since Vegeta was less obscure than Nappa, the audience response to this was mostly positive. A team of medics rushed into the arena through concealed doors as the monitors outside transitioned towards instant replays and statistics. They found nothing wrong with either of the Saiyans, but then again, Goku hadn't provided enough experimental data on Saiyan anatomy for anyone on Earth to even remotely qualify as competent on the subject.

"I underestimated you," Vegeta and Nappa simultaneously said to each other.

"So Nappa, do you accept that one can't dwell on the glories of the past, and that you should turn to the future?" asked Vegeta.

"No." They had nothing more to say to each other for some time.

* * *

It was now 12:20. The second battle would begin soon, and Master Roshi was only now beginning to notice the shocking amount of yellow skinned peoples in the audience. Sure, 6 wasn't a lot, but for most people, jaundice was a symptom of a disease. It turns out that Homer Simpson had brought his family with him - besides his immediate nuclear family, his grandfather Abe, and his son's friend Milhouse had somehow secured tickets.

"This guy already outgluttoned Homer, and now they're going to have a real fight? I'm not sure if this is cool, or disturbing," Bart said to his sister.

"Personally, I think it's strange that we travelled to an alternate dimension for the sole purpose of watching a fight," responded Lisa.

"Yeah, like that's the weirdest thing that's ever happened to us. Remember that time Mr. Burns tried to turn people into bars of gold?"

And now, Goku and Homer had made their presence known on the roof of the arena.

"Hey, Homeslice! What'd you have for dinner yesterday?" Goku shouted at his opponent. It was all in good fun.

"I had pork chops and a can of beer!" responded Homer.

"You should try to eat more vegetables!" And they were lowered into the arena.

"In this next fight, we see if my former student, Son Goku, can beat his opponent... Homer J. Simpson, who hails all the way from America!" Cue boos from one side of the stadium, and cheers from the other.

"The last fight was defined by pure, seething hatred! This one is most assuredly in the friendly spirit that a tournament should have! And it begins!"

Nobody was expecting Goku and Homer to both shout, "KAMEHAMEHA!", flail their arms about, and then spaw giant waves of destructive energy at each other.

"I invented that move!"

Eventually, Goku and Homer decided that duking it out Dragon Ball Z style was pointless, and decided instead to punch each other like boxers. Of course, due to the very nature of their martial arts, they blew through an entire boxing match's worth of punches every few seconds. Marge had almost instantly averted her eyes. "I'm not looking unless my Homer's winning," she said, and somehow this was accepted as an explanation. Bart was staring at the viewscreens with rapt attention, while Lisa was staring off into space.

"I don't think it's possible to move that fast without bursting into flames from the friction," she informed the crowds. As if to prove her point, Goku seemingly caught fire.

"Goku promised me that he'd be pulling out his first secret weapon about now. Apparently one of the Kais sold the secret to him in return for some bizarre favor." Roshi was shrewd enough to notice that Goku had suddenly become even faster.

"Don't have a cow, man!" Homer shouted at him, terminating the newfound hyperactivity with one lucky haymaker to the face. Goku found himself stumbling around in large circles, and barely steered behind one of the inner walls to catch his breath.

*Hey, isn't that my line?* Bart thought from outside the arena. Inside the arena, Goku almost shouted "Aye carumba!", but thought better of it. By now, he'd mostly regained his equilibrium, and took the opportunity to spin around in place like Vegeta had earlier. Homer was also in the mood to rip off the previous battle; he took the opportunity to jump on Goku's head and start attacking it. Unfortunately, he lacked Nappa's precognitive powers, and was unable to anticipate Goku not only withstanding the blows, but grabbing him by the legs, and swinging him around as if he were a shotput.

From a private room, Vegeta monitored the madness. In retrospect, the arena was not very conducive to 'realistic' fighting. Battles fought within its walls were most likely to be fundamentally absurd. On the plus side, the fans seemed to like it. His eyes strayed from the cameras to a computer looking at a website ('Birdspitter') for microblogging. A steady stream of gibberish was appearing on the front page, and much of it was masturbatory praise for the tournament. He noted that it had suddenly increased in intensity, because Homer Simpson had apparently done something very flashy and insane.

Specifically, when he realized that he was going to be flung into a wall, he'd fired a Kamehameha wave at the ground. The sheer force of it knocked Goku over and sent him bouncing around the arena. Also, just before it sputtered out and died, he'd managed to aim the beam at Goku, searing his clothing and making it look slightly less fashionable.  
"That was fun! Let's do it again!" Homer decided that Goku was completely out of his mind, but before he could parse the implications (slowly, because he really wasn't very intelligent), he was picked up bodily, swung, and flung into the wall. It knocked him unconscious, of course.

"That was brutal!" Bart cheered from outside the arena. Clearly he was enjoying it too much.

"Yes, but he's been hurt far worse. He's even standing up now." Lisa pointed at the viewscreen. Homer wasn't very stable, but he was on his feet. But not for long; Goku aimed a low kick at his ankle, and he fell over again. Then he stood up, got kicked down, and so on. It was definitely onesided at this point.

"You should give," was Goku's advice. "I can do this all day, and I'm beginning to feel hungry."

"He really should give," Roshi told the audience.

"Never!" Homer shouted, and Goku had to knock him over seven more times before he stayed on the ground for more than 10 seconds.

* * *

In comparison to the last two fights, the match between Tien Shinhan and Yamcha promised far less insanity, but Master Roshi definitely wasn't going to admit that to the crowds. But that wasn't quite yet - someone had entered Roshi's skybox, and handed him a slip of paper.

"Uh, it turns out the third quarterfinal match is being delayed until 1:00. Vegeta informs us they want to repair some recent damage to the arena. And it's a good cause, too. Would you want to be minding your own buisness one day, when suddenly, a huge wave of energy pierces the wall and kills you? We'll be back soon. I'm Master Roshi."

Much booing from the crowd, who (absurdly) weren't adverse to the fights breaking the walls and smashing up the arena, even if they did all die in the process. Eventually, the members realized that this left them with some free time, and they began idly conversing amongst themselves about various topics. It made sense that some of them would ponder the upcoming match between Tien Shinhan and Yamcha.

Not Master Roshi, though. Even if both of them had spent time studying under him, breasts and legs were more interesting. His nosebleed resumed.


	14. More Senseless Infighting

Tao and Raditz were adapting to imprisonment. Their conditions would be called 'indulgent' by the average citizen, but then again, Tao had amassed a significant fortune during his mercenary days, and it was worth spending a few zeni for perks. Not too much, of course. But as a result of it, their cells had hot water, and a computer. Therefore, they weren't cut off from the outside world, as long as their behavior was acceptable. Tao had made limited use of the amenities - hot water came in handy when he bathed, but he had turned on the computer twice in the last few weeks - once, to make sure it worked, and another time, to place a small bet on Goku winning the tournament. He had no qualms about profiting off his target, and the outside world would think he was beginning to redeem himself. Not that he had any intent of reforming - treating Raditz with respect was about the limit of what he was willing to change, and that was only for pragmatic purposes.

One of the ironies of their cell was that it had a window. It allowed in some quantity of natural light, and was, in the hands of even a novice martial artist, no better than tissue paper. Besides, they were held in not by actual security measures, but by the threat of immediate retribution by other warriors. So, on the day of the tournament, when someone decided to use this window as a doorbell, Tao was appreciably confused. Visual inspection showed that the person tapping on the window was old, greying, and apparently not very attached to his own life, because alarm klaxons were already blaring.

*Communicate telepathically,* Tao transmitted to the elder, in the hopes that he would receive and comprehend it. It succeeded - the man nodded, and left in a flash. A moment later, Tao and Raditz heard gunfire, but not the signature impact of slugs on flesh. A few seconds later, it and alarms also stopped. To the outside world, it would appear that some freak had attempted to spring a dangerous criminal for reasons unknown. By not taking advantage of the chaos and 'escaping', Tao would also further cement his good will amongst the world.

He waited a few minutes, and then came to a decision.

*I am safe,* a voice came into Tao's head. It was clearly not his own.

*What do you want?* Tao responded to it. He couldn't help but think of power for reasons unknown to him. a

*We are in a rare situation where our interests coincide. You seek power, and I need to do some experiments.* In an unknown location, Tao's interlocutor found himself preoccupied with a fantasy of conquering the universe, while Tao imagined his body deforming into a hulking monstrosity, able to destroy planets with a mere blink of an eye. The vivid imagery propelled them several steps ahead.

*There is a small fly outside the prison. If you give the word, it will enter your room and bite you, injecting you with products of my genetic research. You will sicken, to the point of near death, with only your cybernetic enhancements keeping you alive. You will be relocated to a morgue, where you should wake up, relatively unharmed. If not, my servants will retrieve you. You will be unable to show yourself without an exceptional disguise, but you will be otherwise free.* As soon as he explained this, Tao's seeming benefactor wondered if his plan was too complicated.

*And this is where the bizarre experiments come in? Who is Cell? How is a robot supposed to be able to use ki? Are you sure you haven't thought too much?* Then, Tao remembered the book. It had went on to some extent about one Cell, who had come close to victory, but failed when someone had decided that transformations had to have their own power levels.

*Look, do you want my assistance or not? Raditz wouldn't be able to fully appreciate the process, Nappa already rejected my services, Vegeta doesn't need them, and everyone else isn't ambitious enough.* This instigated several minutes of silence on the airwaves.

"I accept your offer," Then Tao realized he had not only telepathically informed the stranger of this, but had spoken it out loud. This sort of communication was more complex and far more difficult than what the Z-Fighters used, and it came with the risk of temporary ego death. The information density, on the other hand, was unparalleled.

Raditz had been staring at Tao for the last few minutes, suspecting some sort of outwards communication, and at these words, his patience broke.

"What offer? Who are you talking to? Are you planning to betray me?" he shouted.

"If there is one thing I have learned in these last few months, it is not to destroy my own allies," sneered Tao. He heard a slight buzzing, and a prick on his neck, near the intersection of flesh and steel.

"Now is not the place to talk about plans," Tao continued. Before Raditz could respond, Tao fell down and started foaming at the mouth.

* * *

Yamcha and Tien Shinhan were now being lowered into the ring. They had explicitly promised the viewers the future of martial arts, and they were both more interested in doing that than merely winning. Of course, it wasn't like they weren't trying to win, either. They'd worked themselves to the bone in the days coming up the tournament, and had designed all sorts of new techniques. If Goku hadn't been dropped to Earth and completely wrecked the balance of power, this would definitely be the culmination of Earth's martial arts. Even then, they were still doing quite well.

"Ladies and gentlemen, the third round of the quarterfinals of the Vegeta games is about to begin! As we speak, two of my former students are planning to whack each other with thousands of years of the art of war until one of them is declared superior to the other! It's fundamentally absurd, but it's what we came here for, and what we enjoy! And to think that I've educated so many finalists in this tournament! I must be the greatest teacher alive!" Frankly, he wasn't. The best teacher in the universe was a protoplasm living near the center of the Milky Way, and it specialized in calculus. Roshi had done a surprisingly good job with the Z Fighters, but that wasn't even close.

But before anyone could challenge Roshi's claim, the round began. Yamcha and Tien bowed stiffly to another, then tackled each other with the strength of a hundred horses. Seconds in, the arena had become a moon bounce, and nobody was surprised.

Tien Shinhan got in the first productive attack, piledriving Yamcha in the stomach. It was good for a minor wound at best, and a small spot of blood appeared on Yamcha's uniform. Tien only took a split second to recover from this attack, but it was enough time for Yamcha to punch him in the face.

"WOLF FANG FIST!" said Yamcha, as Tien reeled around, before he delivered a more powerful, ki-enhanced punch. That was dodged. Tien knocked Yamcha off his feet with a low kick, and once their eyes were at approximately equivalent level, shouted "SOLAR FLARE!", releasing a light so intense that half the cameras in the arena rebooted from critical systems errors.

"Well, it's a good thing I have sunglasses!" Roshi shouted from his booth. Even with half of the viewscreens showing nothing, the light from the monitors was intense enough to hurt the audiences' eyes.

Inside the arena, things were far more graceful. Yamcha was spinning around like a top, and Tien was dancing around him as if it was a harvest ritual. Eventually, Yamcha opened his eyes, and found a faceful of Tien greeting him. The logical course was to spit in the guy's third eye - not an injury, but it would certainly disgust him for long enough to allow further planning.

"DODUN RAY!" Tien announced. It singed Yamcha's hair.

"DOUBLE DODUN RAY!" These were way off.

"DODUN FOOT RAY!" That was just ridiculous. But the audience seemed to find the beam of light emanating from Tien's left foot and colliding with Yamcha's stomach fairly amusing.

"We're the only people I know who regularly call their attacks," claimed Yamcha from his new-found prone position on the ground.

"Yeah, that's weird-" Yamcha handflipped a bit, and soon had Tien's neck in a powerful leglock. A slight application of pressure later, Tien began to suffocate.

"See you in a minute," muttered the only person in the arena with a reasonable supply of air. Then he felt his legs clamp together, and hazarded a look - just an afterimage.

"ANAL DODUN RAY!" This was mildly offensive to some of the audience. It kicked off a series of energy beams from increasingly unlikely places.

"He should try vomiting ki on a regular basis," Nappa sneered from the spectator's stand. Anyways, Dodun abuse wasn't working, so Tien decided to pull out his big guns. He dashed behind a wall, where Yamcha couldn't instantaneously see him, and muttered a few incantations. Apparently one of them was coincidentally a prayer to Xom, who slapped him with a rainbow trout, but the rest worked, and Tien soon found himself split into four bodies, each with four arms. When Yamcha saw this, he found it disturbing.

"TRI-BEAM!" four voices shouted. Four gigantic blasts of energy aimed at Yamcha. All of them hit. Yamcha broke through one of the inner walls, but the sturdier outer ones absorbed his impact. Of course, the energy waves had knocked him unconscious before picking him up and sending him flying. Tien thought he'd won, but his knees then buckled under him, and he realized that he might've used too much energy. He too, fell unconscious. Neither of the two were up after 10 seconds.

"Wow! Who would've expected that? Will Tien Shinhan's massive attack pay off? We'll find out, once we see who's the first to get up!" The paramedics rushed into the arena, found that both of the contestants were suitably alive, rushed out. Four awkward minutes passed, before one of the contestants opened their eyes.

"The winner of this round is Yamcha! Join us at 1:15, for the last quarterfinal, which is sure to be amazingly different from the last three!" Some cheers - it'd been the closest match yet, and the audience had expeted this.

Tien Shinhan woke up about 30 seconds later. Nobody was paying attention, but they would've heard a low "Fuck!" escape his lips soon afterwards. Then he stood up and exited the arena as if nothing had happened.

* * *

1:15 arrived uneventfully, and the contestants arrived in the arena.

"This final portion of the quarterfinal is a match between one Piccolo, and Tien Shinhan's top student, Catherine Hoiruraito!" shouted Roshi from the announcement booth. Somewhere in the bleachers, Tien facepalmed.

"Piccolo's an interesting fellow. You see, he's from a race of aliens known as Namekians, and has tried to conquer this planet on two separate occasions!"

"YEAH, HE SUCKS!" shouted an audience member, who was met with murmurs of approval.

"He fought in the 23rd Budokai under the pseudonym 'Ma Junior', and between then and now, he turned good, joining the Z-Fighters to defend against such threats at Mercenary Tao and Raditz. It just goes to show what a good influence they are. Can I get three cheers for the Z-Fighters?" Stone silence.

"No? Well, you guys are assholes. The other contestant's interesting too. Only female to make it to the quarterfinals. That's just sad; can't we get some more sexy ladies in future tournaments?" At which point someone threw a bottle at the commentating booth. Roshi had the sense to stop talking.

Inside the arena, Piccolo sighed.

"If you beat me, it doesn't mean you're better than Tien Shinhan," he halfheartedly said.

"Yes it does," responded Catherine. Then she punched him in the face, and all bets were off. Piccolo body slammed Catherine into one of the walls, and dodged out of the way before he could get smashed by the rebound. While she recovered from the initial shock, he began tugging at his arm, eventually ripping it out of his socket.

"It seems Piccolo is applying his unique Namekian abilities to exploit a loophole in the rules!" Sure enough, just as Catherine launched a flying kick at Piccolo's unguarded, armless left side, an arm popped out, and grabbed her leg. Not being perturbed, she launched a few small energy balls at Piccolo's face, causing him to let go of the leg and arm, and recoil in pain for a few seconds.

"Oh my god, the girl's beating up Piccolo with his own arm!" Roshi said, stating the obvious for the oblivious members of the audience. While Piccolo was able to block the blows, he did get manuvered into a corner. Desperation struck him.

"You're fat," sneered Piccolo at Catherine, hoping to exploit some sort of body issues. It didn't work, and he was soon knocked unconscious by his own appendages.

"And Catherine wins the fight easily! It goes to show that in a tournament, you should resort to violence instead of petty name calling! Anyways, the semifinals will start at 3:00. Enjoy the intermission, I'm Master Roshi." The spectators slowly egressed from the stands, and millions of people worldwide got up from their computers to make themselves lunches or order fast food. The internet was abuzz with rave reviews of the fighting. Birdspitter's servers were overheating from the sheer amount of traffic. Every fly-by-night video uploading service was filling with recordings. In short, the fighting was absurdly popular.

Goku, unusually, hadn't eaten a thing.

"Senzu beans," he explained to his curious friends. Most of the other contestants had received Namekian style magic healing from Kami, or high tech surgery from the on-site physicians.

Vegeta's appetite was more typical of his species, and he took the time to devour pound after pound of rice. When Goku wandered over to make small conversation, he fixed the other Saiyan with a piercing glaze and asked him a simple question.

"How much does your son eat, Kakarot?"

"I don't really count, but Chi Chi seems to feed him about what you'd expect for a five year old human," Goku responded.

"So half-Saiyans don't inherit our legendary appetites. Interesting, but one isn't really a good sampling size."

"Are you implying you plan to reproduce in the near future?" Vegeta fell onto the floor laughing at this statement.

"Direct as usual, I see. But I do have the discretion to wait until after the tournament," said Vegeta, after he recovered.

"Right."

Vegeta asked a few more questions about Gohan, and eventually informed Goku that he thought that his son was fairly unusual due to his upbringing.

"He'll go far if he gets into a good school," suggested Goku.

"Sure, whatever. I have to get ready to beat someone now. See you at 3:00."

* * *

At 2:30, the semi-final brackets were announced.

_1. Vegeta vs Yamcha_  
_2. Goku vs Catherine_

Humanity as a whole didn't really have a grasp on the innate power of Saiyans, but Nappa, when interrogated by some newfound fans, had this to say:

"Vegeta and Kakarot are definitely going to win their fights. The humans seem to have good technique, but they stand no chance against the might of a Saiyan."

An otaku in the audience asked if Nappa thought he could get further in the tournament had he been matched against a human or a Namekian.

"Wow, you're so perceptive it makes my head hurt," Nappa sneered with the vitriol of a thousand vats of sulfuric acid.

Apparently, people listened to Nappa, because when Vegeta entered the arena, the audience cheered. Yamcha, however, was met with stony silence.

"Welcome to the first match of the semifinals! This first match showcases Vegeta vs Yamcha, and it's clear which side is more popular. Of course, being the completely unbiased judge that I am, I will root for Yamcha," announced Roshi to the audience.

And so this first set of semifinalists were lowered into the arena. Neither of them said a word to each other, most likely because linguistics were deemed a waste of energy. Instead, they merely began punching each other.

"Big deal. Get to the showy stuff!" Homer Simpson shouted from the bleachers.

Due to the skilled work of the technicians, it only took the audience a few seconds to realize that Vegeta was completely ignoring Yamcha's assault, so that every blow Yamcha dealt hit him.

"It appears that Vegeta is showboating!" screamed Roshi. If Yamcha's assault was hurting Vegeta, he certainly did a good job of concealing it. This continued for some time. Then, the audience fell silent, as Vegeta had begun to glow an eerie purple.

"It just keeps getting brighter and brighter!" Roshi continued. Then, Vegeta seemingly exploded, releasing rainbow waves of destruction throughout the arena. Nobody could see it, but Yamcha was being buffeted around by what felt like tornado strength winds. Somehow, he managed to stablize himself, to the point that when Vegeta's attack dissipated, the audience saw them both standing.

One difference: Yamcha was suddenly worse for wear, with scratches and gashes covering his body.

"Hah! Every attack empowers me!" boasted Vegeta.

"Then I must overload your shield!" Yamcha correctly inferred. "WOLF FANG FIST!" And Yamcha released his signature attack. Instead of soaking it up and laughing, Vegeta merely dodged it.

"I'm sorry, Yamcha. I can't let you do that." Vegeta then launched a low kick at his opponent, tripping him up momentarily. Some degree of rolling later, they were on the other side of the arena, and all that remained where they once stood were a few burn marks where Vegeta had released some small blasts of ki. Yamcha was the first to stand up, and of course, he rushed Vegeta, calling his signature Wolf Fang Fist as he ran.

"Wolf Defang Fist," said Vegeta, grabbing Yamcha by the left wrist and throwing him to the ground. The attack's ki dissipated into a few incandescent blue plumes. Outside the arena, the audience laughed uproariously. Inside, Yamcha still wasn't down, and swiped at Vegeta's legs with his fists.

"It appears Yamcha is about to lose! I'd say he uses his arms too much," Roshi quipped. Vegeta merely walked onto Yamcha's back.

"We can do this the easy way, where you concede, or the hard way, where I break your spine. Of course, the doctors can repair it, but why waste their time?" As if to emphasize, the Saiyan shifted his weight slightly, causing Yamcha to moan in pain.

"... Easy way," uttered Yamcha with the last of his strength. With that, Vegeta exchanged physical dominance for symbolic dominance, ending the first semifinal. Beating people up was still fun.

The next semifinal began at 3:30, and showcased Goku against the young 'upstart', Catherine. Even after what happened to Yamcha, she still had fans betting she would win her matchup.

"Now my greatest student faces a student of one of my other students. We've barely seen Goku and Catherine scratch the surface of their capabilities, and I imagine this is going to be the craziest match yet... exceeded only by the final, of course," was what Roshi had to say about this matchup.

So they were lowered into the arena. Goku, being good-natured, tried to banter with his opponent.

"You know, the last woman I fought married me-" he began.

"Don't press your luck." They stared at each other for a moment. "If I beat you, it means I'm better than Tien Shinhan," quipped Catherine.

"That may very well be true," Goku responded. They bowed, and then Goku tackled his opponent. They went flying, like everyone else. Goku's first real move was to fire a giant energy beam of pure Kamehameha at his opponent. It hit, slamming her into a local wall.

*My god, he hits harder than a train made of trucks! I'll have to pull out all my stratagems at once!* Goku watched her promptly sprout an extra pair of arms, and begin charging face-melting energy beams from them. The natural arms were devoted to the reasonable goal of punching Goku as fast as possible. Almost as an afterthought, she aimed some small kicks at him as well.

Goku's strategy was more direct - he dashed the entire length of the arena in a few seconds and started charging another beam. Catherine chased him down, though, so any beam-charging was preempted.

"COME ON! TURN INTO A SUPER SAIYAN!" Trunks shouted from the audience. Nobody knew what he was talking about, and Goku obviously didn't hear him.

Goku tried dashing again, but he found himself smacking into what turned out to be a ball of harmful ki. He looked at the arena - there appeared to be at least a dozen of them strewn throughout the arena and they clearly weren't there before. Obviously, his opponent didn't want him dashing around. And there she was conjuring another one-

"Okay then-" Goku began, before all of them slammed into his body. It stung, but he'd felt worse pain in his life.

*Better use my second secret weapon,* decided Goku. He then conjured an energy barrier around himself, and began leisurely perambulating around the arena.

"Is this also a form of showboating?" Roshi asked the audience. Nobody really knew yet. Least of all, Catherine, who began blasting at it with all her might. She was able to tear a few holes in it, but they almost immediately sealed up. Then, Goku began expanding it, forcing his opponent into a wall. The attacks grew more frenzied, but Goku kept adding more energy, and reshaping the barrier into an impenetrable wall around Catherine.

"Pretty cool, isn't it?" he asked her.

"I am so stealing this, or at least mimicking it," she responded, without a trace of fear of despair, only resentment.

"Good for you!" And Goku launched the energy in the barrier at Catherine, overloading her brain, and causing the biological equivalent of a warm reboot. Needless to say, he won.

* * *

The final match of the tournament was scheduled for 8 PM that day, placing it in competition with various sitcoms and game shows. Since many of the viewers were (in normal times) obsessed with these, they suffered a great deal of cognitive dissonance until they realized they could just record one event and watch it later.

In a secluded room, Vegeta had filled a whiteboard with Namekian scrawl summarizing everything he knew about Goku's combat style.

*Now, he won his first fight by boosting his energy output. He didn't have to do that for the second fight. I took scouter readings, and I'm at 24,000, while he's at 12,000. During the first fight, he managed to peak at 36,000, but only for a brief period. I guess that I need to fight smart to stand a chance against him if he reuses his boosting technique, but if not... well, I still should show some intelligence-* Vegeta summarized his findings. Then, the door opened. Our favorite character, Trucks, had found him.

"Hey, I didn't know you were in here, Vegeta! Say, are you writing in Namekian? What's it say?" As usual, he was full of questions.

"I'm working out how to defeat Kakarott, Trucks. You would do the same thing if you were in my position."

"Why don't you challenge him to a game of mahjong?" Vegeta glared at him.

"Just kidding! If you win, are you going to try and take over the world?"

Vegeta didn't stop glaring at him.

"What the hell, kid? I might've worked for a planet conquering maniac in the past, but I've turned over a new leaf! I want to depose him so that a kind, just government takes his place!" sputtered Vegeta in response to Trucks' questions.

"Yeesh. You were a lot cooler in the anime. Well, I'm going to play Budokai now. You have fun, okay?" And Trucks left, leaving Vegeta alone.

*I sure hope he doesn't tell anyone I'm here-* Upon realizing this, Vegeta feverishly removed his observations from the whiteboard.

*What the kid doesn't realize is that I wish to do the same thing to this world, for the same reasons. Anything is better than being ruled by a talking dog. I bet these people would even accept me as their benevolent warrior-poet-king. I just need to get the Z Fighters out of the picture so I can try it.* At this point, an odd look came over Vegeta, as he began replicating his previous strategic ideas on the whiteboard.


	15. Fulfilled Expectations

In an alternate dimension, Charles Montgomery Burns turned off his television, and pulled out a DVD. Kami's dimensional seal was generally effective, but there were small cracks in it. Accomplished senders could send objects of significant size through the barriers. Therefore, Burns remained connected to the Dragon World by virtue of sneakernet.

The DVD had the words "Vegeta Games Raw Footage" scrawled on it. Mr. Burns had spent the last few hours watching and analyzing it. The footage wasn't great, and it only contained the eliminations, but it was sufficient for his needs. To this end, he began dialing a special number on his old rotary phone.

"Ahoy hoy?" called a voice from the other end. In any other circumstance, this would've been strange, but in these, it was a signal.

"Hello, Dodoria. This is Mr. Burns. I received the tapes. Numbers 327, 185, and 800 had performance of considerable merit, but were eliminated by quarterfinalists. They might be included in the assault."

"Dutifully noted. In return for 5 megawatts per week of power delivery and some fission byproducts, we will send 100 mercenaries."

"That seems acceptable. Why, I'll start conquering third world countries right away!"

A few more pleasantries were exchanged before they hung up. Mr. Burns sat back in his chair.

*I think I'll betray him in about a week. He'll have his hands full by then, and I can write it off as one of my unusual changes of heart.*

He fired a small bolt of blue energy (which he still called the 'Nuclear Power Beam') at a picture of Frieza mounted over the door. It seared the paint.

* * *

There were 20 minutes to go before the final battle. Piccolo was aimlessly wandering the halls of the facilities, when he noticed that a door was slightly ajar. He decided to ignore it, but he couldn't help noticing a sliver of text.

*I'll just read it quickly in case someone's looking,* he thought, pushing the door open. Then his jaw dropped, as the ramifications of the text struck him like a blacksmith's hammer on one of Wile E. Coyote's anvils.

*Vegeta did what?* said a voice in his head. It wasn't his; apparently in his moment of weakness Piccolo had dropped the mental shielding that prevented Kami from knowing everything that passed through his head.

*Yes, he did. Not that there's anything wrong with it,* Piccolo responded, assuming Kami had parsed Vegeta's strategic writings.

*Well, you're technically right. But what do we do?*

*Get high on the dry erase markers?*

*Not that again. It's not like they can hurt you, but altering your mind like that isn't good for both of us. I'm telling Goku about this.*

Kami just happened to be standing next to Goku at this point.

"Um, Goku, can we talk?" he asked.

"Sure. What do you need to say?" responded Goku without a hint of anxiety in his voice.

"Well, I thought now would be as good a time to tell you something about Vegeta. You see, his peak energy levels are higher than yours, so unless you do something drastic, he'll overpower you by virtue of superior strength alone."

"Don't worry, man! I still haven't used my third technique. Besides, the other two can't be countered simply by knowing about them. I'm sure I can beat Vegeta without any problems."

"Right." They stared at each other for a moment.

"You're still worried, aren't you?" Goku asked the Namek after some time.

"It's my job."

The next few minutes were tense for Kami, relaxed for Goku, calculated for Vegeta, and psychedelic for Piccolo. Eventually the Saiyans made their way to the arena. When they appeared in front of the audience, they posed an important dilemma solely by existing. Specifically, the mainly human spectators were wondering if the sheer skill they were expecting from the opponents outweighed, reputationwise, the fact that said opponents weren't human. Eventually the former won out slightly, and there was some halfhearted cheering.

Roshi, on the other hand, had worked himself up into a frenzy.

"This is the most important fight in the history of the universe? Can one alien beat another? Will someone win this fight? Probably! And I trained one of those aliens, so I have something to prove in this fight! Goku, if you can hear me, win this match for me! If not, do so anyways!"

It was like a soccer match to determine whether Mexico or Portugal was the best country in the world. Roshi was giving the matter the gravitas that it would deserve if Vegeta were hell-bent on destroying Earth, and therefore following Vegeta's instructions in spirit, if not to the letter.

Needless to say, Vegeta wasn't planning to destroy the ground he stood on, but in fact had great plans for it. They were lowered into the arena.

"I hope you try," said Goku.

"Surely you aren't insinuating I'll throw the match?" Vegeta responded.

"Nah. It's just that I'm so much better than you that I want it to look tenser for a bit."

"I'm going to ignore that." Vegeta aimed a few punches at the air around Goku, who ignored them. Then, out of curiosity, Vegeta tried kicking at Goku's ankles. At this point, the Saiyan deftly dodged out of the way, and released an unfocused cloud of ki at Vegeta.

"And Vegeta doesn't want to find out what the first real attack from Goku is, so he dodges it! A solid choice indeed!" shouted Roshi at the crowds.

Inside the arena, Goku was pulling out trick after trick - bouncing projectiles, shields, feinted kicks. Vegeta, on the other hand, managed to counter each and every one, even when Goku tried employing everything at once. He picked the ki balls out of the air, threw them at Goku's legs, disrupting the concentration he needed for localized shielding effects, leaving Goku with a net reduction of stamina.

"I've totally got access to better attacks than you tactic!" Goku should've shouted. Instead, he merely announced that he was using the Kaio-Ken x4, and burst into red flames. For a brief moment, Vegeta didn't quite have the reflexes to counter all the crazy shit Goku was throwing at him, and he found himself inside a ki cloud. It was awful - painful electric shocks arced through his body, his brain felt like it had turned into fire, and once it dissipated (along with the Kaio-ken), he felt as if he'd been drained of significant amount of energy.

Goku, on the other hand, didn't think it was enough, because once Vegeta escaped the storm, he seemed relatively back to normal, and Goku's bag of tricks again failed to make their marks.

"And it looks like this match is just going to come down to whether Goku can output his energy fast enough! That cloud thing took a lot out of his opponent, but unless he turns red again, it's not going to reoccur," Roshi informed the audience. Frankly, he knew what was going on; for a brief period in the late 400s he'd been the strongest human alive.

Inside, Goku was debating whether to use his 3rd secret weapon or not. Part of him thought it would be too risky. Another part thought it'd be unsporting. A third part pondered sandwiches.

*Goddamnit, learn to focus!* shouted the sandwich cortex in Goku's mind. It confused the opposition, allowing a few lumps of grey matter representing approval the public support they needed to push the resolution through, allowing Goku to use his 'ultimate' technique.

Goku did a couple of handflips back behind a low wall and laid a low-level ki storm in an area that Vegeta could otherwise have easily jumped through. Then, all of his thoughts turned to the television show known as "Bleach".

"Holy crap, he's learned to magically dye his own hair!"  
"Nah, he probably smuggled in some spiking gel."  
"That's strange enough, but why the colored contacts?"  
"Call the runways! Tell the fashion designers to imitate this slavishly!"

In short, Goku's physical appearance had altered in unexpected ways, confusing and dismaying the audience.

Trucks, on the other hand, was overflowing with surprise and joy.  
"Holy crap! He turned Super Saiyan, guys! He's totally going to win now! He's like 50 times more powerful now!" Odds were, he was going to babble about it to his school friends for weeks, until they could take no more and began reading Heidegger to end their suffering.

Back in the fight, Vegeta was now pulling out his own tricks, which involved enough garlic to season an Italian restaurant's daily quota of breadsticks. Unfortunately for him, Goku had not suddenly become a vampire, and instead of falling over or otherwise being injured, Goku merely walked nonchalantly towards Vegeta, as if nothing were happening, and picked him up by the neck with his right arm.

"I can win by merely placing you outside the arena, right?" Goku asked his victim.

"No, you can't," responded Vegeta, who was halfheartedly squirming in an attempt to break free.

"Then this might abraise and contuse you." And Vegeta found himself brutally launched at a wall, hitting it head first, ensuring loss of consciousness.

*I really need to get him off this planet and out of the peoples' minds,* he thought, before taking a quick nap.

Brief silence and confusion from the audience turned into thunderous applause. Apparently quick turnabouts were impressive, although ki storms didn't hurt.

"And the winner is Son Goku! Since I trained him, I must also be a winner-" At this point, Roshi noticed a crudely scrawled sign claiming, "DON'T PUSH YOUR LUCK".

"Uh... but the real winners here are the viewers, who have just seen the climax of the greatest fighting tournament ever! I hope you enjoyed it; we'll be broadcasting the closing ceremonies at 8 PM."

If anything, the Vegeta Games would stimulate economic growth for years to come.

* * *

Vegeta didn't mind losing.

Correction: Vegeta didn't mind losing when his goal was to throw the match. Of course, Kakarot's mysterious transformation had screwed up his pacing, preventing him from making some eloquent speech about how Goku had proven his dominance and that further fighting would only cause senseless pain, therefore inflating Kakarot's ego, enraging Nappa, etc. It could still easily come together. He took the time to look at himself in a mirror and preen his hair. It was a weakness, but one would come in handy in phase 2. Then, he could hire a stylist to handle his looks.

Then, in what has been labeled the 'bone-chillingest horror of the decade', Goku's signature spikes rose up from behind Vegeta, which mildly perturbed him.

"Why are you trying to sneak up on me, Kakarot?" he asked, as if this was an every day occurrence.

"Why are you so easy to sneak up on?" responded Goku. Vegeta made a mental note that Kakarot's ego had, perhaps, inflated a little.

"Whatever. You won the tournament. You're clearly capable of handling the Friezas of the galaxy."

"Well, good for me. But I'm going to need assistance."

"You'll already have the other finalists, and I can recommend a few others from the eliminations."

"So you'll be joining us?"

"Frankly, I need to keep an eye on Nappa, and make sure he doesn't try to destroy your civilization. Therefore, no."

"Uh... right. I need to get ready for the closing ceremonies." And Goku left, but not before slowly crouching behind Vegeta, and 'exiting' the same way he entered.

*He suspects me. Kami has been indoctrinating him. The only solution is to indoctrinate Kami; I suppose a small bribe is in order."

A day later, the Namek was surprised to find a wild boar waiting for him at his lookout.

"What," he said, flatly, to nobody in particular. Inspection revealed it was in relatively good health although unused to high altitudes. A note in Namekian script was attached to a collar (which the boar probably didn't make for itself).

"On the planet Vegeta, it was a sign of good will for one clan to give a wild animal to another. This planet's animals aren't nearly as fearsome or threatening, but I hope the point will get across. Consider it a gift from my throne to yours. Let us hope that one day, a talking dog does not rule the Dragon World."

Kami stared at this for a moment, trying to parse the diplomatic implications.

"Okay, Vegeta's gone off the deep end," he muttered to himself after a while. Then he conjured a leash for the boar, and lead it to destinations unknown.


End file.
